The Python Tutorial

Python is an easy to learn, powerful programming language. It has efficient high-level data structures
and a simple but effective approach to object-oriented programming. Python’s elegant syntax and
dynamic typing, together with its interpreted nature, make it an ideal language for scripting and
rapid application development in many areas on most platforms.

The Python interpreter and the extensive standard library are freely available in source or binary
form for all major platforms from the Python web site, https://www.python.org/, and may be freely
distributed. The same site also contains distributions of and pointers to many free third party Python
modules, programs and tools, and additional documentation.

The Python interpreter is easily extended with new functions and data types implemented in C or C+
+ (or other languages callable from C). Python is also suitable as an extension language for
customizable applications.

This tutorial introduces the reader informally to the basic concepts and features of the Python
language and system. It helps to have a Python interpreter handy for hands-on experience, but all
examples are self-contained, so the tutorial can be read off-line as well.

For a description of standard objects and modules, see The Python Standard Library. The Python
Language Reference gives a more formal definition of the language. To write extensions in C or C++,
read Extending and Embedding the Python Interpreter and Python/C API Reference Manual. There
are also several books covering Python in depth.

This tutorial does not attempt to be comprehensive and cover every single feature, or even every
commonly used feature. Instead, it introduces many of Python’s most noteworthy features, and will
give you a good idea of the language’s flavor and style. After reading it, you will be able to read and
write Python modules and programs, and you will be ready to learn more about the various Python
library modules described in The Python Standard Library.

The Glossary is also worth going through.

 1. Whetting Your Appetite

 2. Using the Python Interpreter

o 2.1. Invoking the Interpreter

 2.1.1. Argument Passing

 2.1.2. Interactive Mode

o 2.2. The Interpreter and Its Environment

 2.2.1. Source Code Encoding

 3. An Informal Introduction to Python

o 3.1. Using Python as a Calculator

 3.1.1. Numbers

 3.1.2. Text

 3.1.3. Lists
 o 3.2. First Steps Towards Programming

 4. More Control Flow Tools

o 4.1. if Statements

o 4.2. for Statements

o 4.3. The range() Function

o 4.4. break and continue Statements

o 4.5. else Clauses on Loops

o 4.6. pass Statements

o 4.7. match Statements

o 4.8. Defining Functions

o 4.9. More on Defining Functions

 4.9.1. Default Argument Values

 4.9.2. Keyword Arguments

 4.9.3. Special parameters

 4.9.3.1. Positional-or-Keyword Arguments

 4.9.3.2. Positional-Only Parameters

 4.9.3.3. Keyword-Only Arguments

 4.9.3.4. Function Examples

 4.9.3.5. Recap

 4.9.4. Arbitrary Argument Lists

 4.9.5. Unpacking Argument Lists

 4.9.6. Lambda Expressions

 4.9.7. Documentation Strings

 4.9.8. Function Annotations

o 4.10. Intermezzo: Coding Style

 5. Data Structures

o 5.1. More on Lists

 5.1.1. Using Lists as Stacks

 5.1.2. Using Lists as Queues

 5.1.3. List Comprehensions

 5.1.4. Nested List Comprehensions

 o 5.2. The del statement

o 5.3. Tuples and Sequences

o 5.4. Sets

o 5.5. Dictionaries

o 5.6. Looping Techniques

o 5.7. More on Conditions

o 5.8. Comparing Sequences and Other Types

 6. Modules

o 6.1. More on Modules

 6.1.1. Executing modules as scripts

 6.1.2. The Module Search Path

 6.1.3. “Compiled” Python files

o 6.2. Standard Modules

o 6.3. The dir() Function

o 6.4. Packages

 6.4.1. Importing * From a Package

 6.4.2. Intra-package References

 6.4.3. Packages in Multiple Directories

 7. Input and Output

o 7.1. Fancier Output Formatting

 7.1.1. Formatted String Literals

 7.1.2. The String format() Method

 7.1.3. Manual String Formatting

 7.1.4. Old string formatting

o 7.2. Reading and Writing Files

 7.2.1. Methods of File Objects

 7.2.2. Saving structured data with json

 8. Errors and Exceptions

o 8.1. Syntax Errors

o 8.2. Exceptions

o 8.3. Handling Exceptions

 o 8.4. Raising Exceptions

o 8.5. Exception Chaining

o 8.6. User-defined Exceptions

o 8.7. Defining Clean-up Actions

o 8.8. Predefined Clean-up Actions

o 8.9. Raising and Handling Multiple Unrelated Exceptions

o 8.10. Enriching Exceptions with Notes

 9. Classes

o 9.1. A Word About Names and Objects

o 9.2. Python Scopes and Namespaces

 9.2.1. Scopes and Namespaces Example

o 9.3. A First Look at Classes

 9.3.1. Class Definition Syntax

 9.3.2. Class Objects

 9.3.3. Instance Objects

 9.3.4. Method Objects

 9.3.5. Class and Instance Variables

o 9.4. Random Remarks

o 9.5. Inheritance

 9.5.1. Multiple Inheritance

o 9.6. Private Variables

o 9.7. Odds and Ends

o 9.8. Iterators

o 9.9. Generators

o 9.10. Generator Expressions

 10. Brief Tour of the Standard Library

o 10.1. Operating System Interface

o 10.2. File Wildcards

o 10.3. Command Line Arguments

o 10.4. Error Output Redirection and Program Termination

o 10.5. String Pattern Matching

 o 10.6. Mathematics

o 10.7. Internet Access

o 10.8. Dates and Times

o 10.9. Data Compression

o 10.10. Performance Measurement

o 10.11. Quality Control

o 10.12. Batteries Included

 11. Brief Tour of the Standard Library — Part II

o 11.1. Output Formatting

o 11.2. Templating

o 11.3. Working with Binary Data Record Layouts

o 11.4. Multi-threading

o 11.5. Logging

o 11.6. Weak References

o 11.7. Tools for Working with Lists

o 11.8. Decimal Floating-Point Arithmetic

 12. Virtual Environments and Packages

o 12.1. Introduction

o 12.2. Creating Virtual Environments

o 12.3. Managing Packages with pip

 13. What Now?

 14. Interactive Input Editing and History Substitution

o 14.1. Tab Completion and History Editing

o 14.2. Alternatives to the Interactive Interpreter

 15. Floating-Point Arithmetic: Issues and Limitations

o 15.1. Representation Error

 16. Appendix

o 16.1. Interactive Mode

 16.1.1. Error Handling

 16.1.2. Executable Python Scripts

 16.1.3. The Interactive Startup File

  16.1.4. The Customization Modules

1. Whetting Your Appetite¶

If you do much work on computers, eventually you find that there’s some task you’d like to
automate. For example, you may wish to perform a search-and-replace over a large number of text
files, or rename and rearrange a bunch of photo files in a complicated way. Perhaps you’d like to
write a small custom database, or a specialized GUI application, or a simple game.

If you’re a professional software developer, you may have to work with several C/C++/Java libraries
but find the usual write/compile/test/re-compile cycle is too slow. Perhaps you’re writing a test suite
for such a library and find writing the testing code a tedious task. Or maybe you’ve written a program
that could use an extension language, and you don’t want to design and implement a whole new
language for your application.

Python is just the language for you.

You could write a Unix shell script or Windows batch files for some of these tasks, but shell scripts
are best at moving around files and changing text data, not well-suited for GUI applications or games.
You could write a C/C++/Java program, but it can take a lot of development time to get even a first-
draft program. Python is simpler to use, available on Windows, macOS, and Unix operating systems,
and will help you get the job done more quickly.

Python is simple to use, but it is a real programming language, offering much more structure and
support for large programs than shell scripts or batch files can offer. On the other hand, Python also
offers much more error checking than C, and, being a very-high-level language, it has high-level data
types built in, such as flexible arrays and dictionaries. Because of its more general data types Python
is applicable to a much larger problem domain than Awk or even Perl, yet many things are at least as
easy in Python as in those languages.

Python allows you to split your program into modules that can be reused in other Python programs.
It comes with a large collection of standard modules that you can use as the basis of your programs
— or as examples to start learning to program in Python. Some of these modules provide things like
file I/O, system calls, sockets, and even interfaces to graphical user interface toolkits like Tk.

Python is an interpreted language, which can save you considerable time during program
development because no compilation and linking is necessary. The interpreter can be used
interactively, which makes it easy to experiment with features of the language, to write throw-away
programs, or to test functions during bottom-up program development. It is also a handy desk
calculator.

Python enables programs to be written compactly and readably. Programs written in Python are
typically much shorter than equivalent C, C++, or Java programs, for several reasons:

 the high-level data types allow you to express complex operations in a single statement;

 statement grouping is done by indentation instead of beginning and ending brackets;

 no variable or argument declarations are necessary.

Python is extensible: if you know how to program in C it is easy to add a new built-in function or
module to the interpreter, either to perform critical operations at maximum speed, or to link Python
programs to libraries that may only be available in binary form (such as a vendor-specific graphics
library). Once you are really hooked, you can link the Python interpreter into an application written in
C and use it as an extension or command language for that application.

By the way, the language is named after the BBC show “Monty Python’s Flying Circus” and has
nothing to do with reptiles. Making references to Monty Python skits in documentation is not only
allowed, it is encouraged!

Now that you are all excited about Python, you’ll want to examine it in some more detail. Since the
best way to learn a language is to use it, the tutorial invites you to play with the Python interpreter as
you read.

In the next chapter, the mechanics of using the interpreter are explained. This is rather mundane
information, but essential for trying out the examples shown later.

The rest of the tutorial introduces various features of the Python language and system through
examples, beginning with simple expressions, statements and data types, through functions and
modules, and finally touching upon advanced concepts like exceptions and user-defined classes.

2. Using the Python Interpreter

2.1. Invoking the Interpreter

The Python interpreter is usually installed as /usr/local/bin/python3.13 on those machines where it

is available; putting /usr/local/bin in your Unix shell’s search path makes it possible to start it by
typing the command:

python3.13

to the shell. [1] Since the choice of the directory where the interpreter lives is an installation option,
other places are possible; check with your local Python guru or system administrator.
(E.g., /usr/local/python is a popular alternative location.)

On Windows machines where you have installed Python from the Microsoft Store,
the python3.13 command will be available. If you have the py.exe launcher installed, you can use
the py command. See Excursus: Setting environment variables for other ways to launch Python.

Typing an end-of-file character (Control-D on Unix, Control-Z on Windows) at the primary prompt
causes the interpreter to exit with a zero exit status. If that doesn’t work, you can exit the interpreter
by typing the following command: quit().

The interpreter’s line-editing features include interactive editing, history substitution and code
completion on systems that support the GNU Readline library. Perhaps the quickest check to see
whether command line editing is supported is typing Control-P to the first Python prompt you get. If
it beeps, you have command line editing; see Appendix Interactive Input Editing and History
Substitution for an introduction to the keys. If nothing appears to happen, or if ^P is echoed,
command line editing isn’t available; you’ll only be able to use backspace to remove characters from
the current line.

The interpreter operates somewhat like the Unix shell: when called with standard input connected to
a tty device, it reads and executes commands interactively; when called with a file name argument or
with a file as standard input, it reads and executes a script from that file.
A second way of starting the interpreter is python -c command [arg] ..., which executes the
statement(s) in command, analogous to the shell’s -c option. Since Python statements often contain
spaces or other characters that are special to the shell, it is usually advised to quote command in its
entirety.

Some Python modules are also useful as scripts. These can be invoked using python -
m module [arg] ..., which executes the source file for module as if you had spelled out its full name
on the command line.

When a script file is used, it is sometimes useful to be able to run the script and enter interactive
mode afterwards. This can be done by passing -i before the script.

All command line options are described in Command line and environment.

2.1.1. Argument Passing

When known to the interpreter, the script name and additional arguments thereafter are turned into
a list of strings and assigned to the argv variable in the sys module. You can access this list by
executing import sys. The length of the list is at least one; when no script and no arguments are
given, sys.argv[0] is an empty string. When the script name is given as '-' (meaning standard
input), sys.argv[0] is set to '-'. When -c command is used, sys.argv[0] is set to '-c'. When -m module is
used, sys.argv[0] is set to the full name of the located module. Options found after -c command or -
m module are not consumed by the Python interpreter’s option processing but left in sys.argv for the
command or module to handle.

2.1.2. Interactive Mode

When commands are read from a tty, the interpreter is said to be in interactive mode. In this mode it
prompts for the next command with the primary prompt, usually three greater-than signs (>>>); for
continuation lines it prompts with the secondary prompt, by default three dots (...). The interpreter
prints a welcome message stating its version number and a copyright notice before printing the first
prompt:

$ python3.13

Python 3.13 (default, April 4 2023, 09:25:04)

[GCC 10.2.0] on linux

Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.

>>>

Continuation lines are needed when entering a multi-line construct. As an example, take a look at
this if statement:

>>>

>>> the_world_is_flat = True

>>> if the_world_is_flat:

... print("Be careful not to fall off!")

...
Be careful not to fall off!

For more on interactive mode, see Interactive Mode.

2.2. The Interpreter and Its Environment

2.2.1. Source Code Encoding

By default, Python source files are treated as encoded in UTF-8. In that encoding, characters of most
languages in the world can be used simultaneously in string literals, identifiers and comments —
although the standard library only uses ASCII characters for identifiers, a convention that any
portable code should follow. To display all these characters properly, your editor must recognize that
the file is UTF-8, and it must use a font that supports all the characters in the file.

To declare an encoding other than the default one, a special comment line should be added as
the first line of the file. The syntax is as follows:

# -*- coding: encoding -*-

where encoding is one of the valid codecs supported by Python.

For example, to declare that Windows-1252 encoding is to be used, the first line of your source code
file should be:

# -*- coding: cp1252 -*-

One exception to the first line rule is when the source code starts with a UNIX “shebang” line. In this
case, the encoding declaration should be added as the second line of the file. For example:

#!/usr/bin/env python3

# -*- coding: cp1252 -*-

Footnotes

[1]

On Unix, the Python 3.x interpreter is by default not installed with the executable named python, so
that it does not conflict with a simultaneously installed Python 2.x executable.

2.1.1. Argument Passing

When known to the interpreter, the script name and additional arguments thereafter are turned into
a list of strings and assigned to the argv variable in the sys module. You can access this list by
executing import sys. The length of the list is at least one; when no script and no arguments are
given, sys.argv[0] is an empty string. When the script name is given as '-' (meaning standard
input), sys.argv[0] is set to '-'. When -c command is used, sys.argv[0] is set to '-c'. When -m module is
used, sys.argv[0] is set to the full name of the located module. Options found after -c command or -
m module are not consumed by the Python interpreter’s option processing but left in sys.argv for the
command or module to handle.

2.1.2. Interactive Mode

When commands are read from a tty, the interpreter is said to be in interactive mode. In this mode it
prompts for the next command with the primary prompt, usually three greater-than signs (>>>); for
continuation lines it prompts with the secondary prompt, by default three dots (...). The interpreter
prints a welcome message stating its version number and a copyright notice before printing the first
prompt:

$ python3.13

Python 3.13 (default, April 4 2023, 09:25:04)

[GCC 10.2.0] on linux

Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.

>>>

Continuation lines are needed when entering a multi-line construct. As an example, take a look at
this if statement:

>>>

>>> the_world_is_flat = True

>>> if the_world_is_flat:

... print("Be careful not to fall off!")

...

Be careful not to fall off!

For more on interactive mode, see Interactive Mode.

2.2. The Interpreter and Its Environment

2.2.1. Source Code Encoding

By default, Python source files are treated as encoded in UTF-8. In that encoding, characters of most
languages in the world can be used simultaneously in string literals, identifiers and comments —
although the standard library only uses ASCII characters for identifiers, a convention that any
portable code should follow. To display all these characters properly, your editor must recognize that
the file is UTF-8, and it must use a font that supports all the characters in the file.

To declare an encoding other than the default one, a special comment line should be added as
the first line of the file. The syntax is as follows:

# -*- coding: encoding -*-

where encoding is one of the valid codecs supported by Python.

For example, to declare that Windows-1252 encoding is to be used, the first line of your source code
file should be:

# -*- coding: cp1252 -*-

One exception to the first line rule is when the source code starts with a UNIX “shebang” line. In this
case, the encoding declaration should be added as the second line of the file. For example:

#!/usr/bin/env python3
# -*- coding: cp1252 -*-

Footnotes

[1]

On Unix, the Python 3.x interpreter is by default not installed with the executable named python, so
that it does not conflict with a simultaneously installed Python 2.x executable.

2.1.2. Interactive Mode

When commands are read from a tty, the interpreter is said to be in interactive mode. In this mode it
prompts for the next command with the primary prompt, usually three greater-than signs (>>>); for
continuation lines it prompts with the secondary prompt, by default three dots (...). The interpreter
prints a welcome message stating its version number and a copyright notice before printing the first
prompt:

$ python3.13

Python 3.13 (default, April 4 2023, 09:25:04)

[GCC 10.2.0] on linux

Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.

>>>

Continuation lines are needed when entering a multi-line construct. As an example, take a look at
this if statement:

>>>

>>> the_world_is_flat = True

>>> if the_world_is_flat:

... print("Be careful not to fall off!")

...

Be careful not to fall off!

For more on interactive mode, see Interactive Mode.

2.2. The Interpreter and Its Environment

2.2.1. Source Code Encoding

By default, Python source files are treated as encoded in UTF-8. In that encoding, characters of most
languages in the world can be used simultaneously in string literals, identifiers and comments —
although the standard library only uses ASCII characters for identifiers, a convention that any
portable code should follow. To display all these characters properly, your editor must recognize that
the file is UTF-8, and it must use a font that supports all the characters in the file.

To declare an encoding other than the default one, a special comment line should be added as
the first line of the file. The syntax is as follows:
# -*- coding: encoding -*-

where encoding is one of the valid codecs supported by Python.

For example, to declare that Windows-1252 encoding is to be used, the first line of your source code
file should be:

# -*- coding: cp1252 -*-

One exception to the first line rule is when the source code starts with a UNIX “shebang” line. In this
case, the encoding declaration should be added as the second line of the file. For example:

#!/usr/bin/env python3

# -*- coding: cp1252 -*-

Footnotes

[1]

On Unix, the Python 3.x interpreter is by default not installed with the executable named python, so
that it does not conflict with a simultaneously installed Python 2.x executable.

3. An Informal Introduction to Python

In the following examples, input and output are distinguished by the presence or absence of prompts
(>>> and …): to repeat the example, you must type everything after the prompt, when the prompt
appears; lines that do not begin with a prompt are output from the interpreter. Note that a
secondary prompt on a line by itself in an example means you must type a blank line; this is used to
end a multi-line command.

You can toggle the display of prompts and output by clicking on >>> in the upper-right corner of an
example box. If you hide the prompts and output for an example, then you can easily copy and paste
the input lines into your interpreter.

Many of the examples in this manual, even those entered at the interactive prompt, include
comments. Comments in Python start with the hash character, #, and extend to the end of the
physical line. A comment may appear at the start of a line or following whitespace or code, but not
within a string literal. A hash character within a string literal is just a hash character. Since comments
are to clarify code and are not interpreted by Python, they may be omitted when typing in examples.

Some examples:

# this is the first comment

spam = 1 # and this is the second comment

# ... and now a third!

text = "# This is not a comment because it's inside quotes."

3.1. Using Python as a Calculator

Let’s try some simple Python commands. Start the interpreter and wait for the primary prompt, >>>.
(It shouldn’t take long.)

3.1.1. Numbers
The interpreter acts as a simple calculator: you can type an expression at it and it will write the value.
Expression syntax is straightforward: the operators +, -, * and / can be used to perform arithmetic;
parentheses (()) can be used for grouping. For example:

>>>

>>> 2 + 2

>>> 50 - 5*6

20

>>> (50 - 5*6) / 4

5.0

>>> 8 / 5 # division always returns a floating-point number

1.6

The integer numbers (e.g. 2, 4, 20) have type int, the ones with a fractional part (e.g. 5.0, 1.6) have
type float. We will see more about numeric types later in the tutorial.

Division (/) always returns a float. To do floor division and get an integer result you can use
the // operator; to calculate the remainder you can use %:

>>>

>>> 17 / 3 # classic division returns a float

5.666666666666667

>>>

>>> 17 // 3 # floor division discards the fractional part

>>> 17 % 3 # the % operator returns the remainder of the division

>>> 5 * 3 + 2 # floored quotient * divisor + remainder

17

With Python, it is possible to use the ** operator to calculate powers [1]:

>>>

>>> 5 ** 2 # 5 squared

25

>>> 2 ** 7 # 2 to the power of 7

128
The equal sign (=) is used to assign a value to a variable. Afterwards, no result is displayed before the
next interactive prompt:

>>>

>>> width = 20

>>> height = 5 * 9

>>> width * height

900

If a variable is not “defined” (assigned a value), trying to use it will give you an error:

>>>

>>> n # try to access an undefined variable

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

NameError: name 'n' is not defined

There is full support for floating point; operators with mixed type operands convert the integer
operand to floating point:

>>>

>>> 4 * 3.75 - 1

14.0

In interactive mode, the last printed expression is assigned to the variable _. This means that when
you are using Python as a desk calculator, it is somewhat easier to continue calculations, for example:

>>>

>>> tax = 12.5 / 100

>>> price = 100.50

>>> price * tax

12.5625

>>> price + _

113.0625

>>> round(_, 2)

113.06

This variable should be treated as read-only by the user. Don’t explicitly assign a value to it — you
would create an independent local variable with the same name masking the built-in variable with its
magic behavior.
In addition to int and float, Python supports other types of numbers, such as Decimal and Fraction.
Python also has built-in support for complex numbers, and uses the j or J suffix to indicate the
imaginary part (e.g. 3+5j).

3.1.2. Text

Python can manipulate text (represented by type str, so-called “strings”) as well as numbers. This
includes characters “!”, words “rabbit”, names “Paris”, sentences “Got your back.”, etc. “Yay! :)”. They
can be enclosed in single quotes ('...') or double quotes ("...") with the same result [2].

>>>

>>> 'spam eggs' # single quotes

'spam eggs'

>>> "Paris rabbit got your back :)! Yay!" # double quotes

'Paris rabbit got your back :)! Yay!'

>>> '1975' # digits and numerals enclosed in quotes are also strings

'1975'

To quote a quote, we need to “escape” it, by preceding it with \. Alternatively, we can use the other
type of quotation marks:

>>>

>>> 'doesn\'t' # use \' to escape the single quote...

"doesn't"

>>> "doesn't" # ...or use double quotes instead

"doesn't"

>>> '"Yes," they said.'

'"Yes," they said.'

>>> "\"Yes,\" they said."

'"Yes," they said.'

>>> '"Isn\'t," they said.'

'"Isn\'t," they said.'

In the Python shell, the string definition and output string can look different. The print() function
produces a more readable output, by omitting the enclosing quotes and by printing escaped and
special characters:

>>>

>>> s = 'First line.\nSecond line.' # \n means newline

>>> s # without print(), special characters are included in the string

'First line.\nSecond line.'

>>> print(s) # with print(), special characters are interpreted, so \n produces new line

First line.

Second line.

If you don’t want characters prefaced by \ to be interpreted as special characters, you can use raw
strings by adding an r before the first quote:

>>>

>>> print('C:\some\name') # here \n means newline!

C:\some

ame

>>> print(r'C:\some\name') # note the r before the quote

C:\some\name

There is one subtle aspect to raw strings: a raw string may not end in an odd number of \ characters;
see the FAQ entry for more information and workarounds.

String literals can span multiple lines. One way is using triple-quotes: """...""" or '''...'''. End of lines
are automatically included in the string, but it’s possible to prevent this by adding a \ at the end of
the line. In the following example, the initial newline is not included:

>>>

>>> print("""\

... Usage: thingy [OPTIONS]

... -h Display this usage message

... -H hostname Hostname to connect to

... """)

Usage: thingy [OPTIONS]

-h Display this usage message

-H hostname Hostname to connect to

>>>

Strings can be concatenated (glued together) with the + operator, and repeated with *:

>>>

>>> # 3 times 'un', followed by 'ium'

>>> 3 * 'un' + 'ium'

'unununium'

Two or more string literals (i.e. the ones enclosed between quotes) next to each other are
automatically concatenated.

>>>

>>> 'Py' 'thon'

'Python'

This feature is particularly useful when you want to break long strings:

>>>

>>> text = ('Put several strings within parentheses '

... 'to have them joined together.')

>>> text

'Put several strings within parentheses to have them joined together.'

This only works with two literals though, not with variables or expressions:

>>>

>>> prefix = 'Py'

>>> prefix 'thon' # can't concatenate a variable and a string literal

File "<stdin>", line 1

prefix 'thon'

^^^^^^

SyntaxError: invalid syntax

>>> ('un' * 3) 'ium'

File "<stdin>", line 1

('un' * 3) 'ium'

^^^^^

SyntaxError: invalid syntax

If you want to concatenate variables or a variable and a literal, use +:

>>>

>>> prefix + 'thon'

'Python'

Strings can be indexed (subscripted), with the first character having index 0. There is no separate
character type; a character is simply a string of size one:

>>>
>>> word = 'Python'

>>> word[0] # character in position 0

'P'

>>> word[5] # character in position 5

'n'

Indices may also be negative numbers, to start counting from the right:

>>>

>>> word[-1] # last character

'n'

>>> word[-2] # second-last character

'o'

>>> word[-6]

'P'

Note that since -0 is the same as 0, negative indices start from -1.

In addition to indexing, slicing is also supported. While indexing is used to obtain individual
characters, slicing allows you to obtain a substring:

>>>

>>> word[0:2] # characters from position 0 (included) to 2 (excluded)

'Py'

>>> word[2:5] # characters from position 2 (included) to 5 (excluded)

'tho'

Slice indices have useful defaults; an omitted first index defaults to zero, an omitted second index
defaults to the size of the string being sliced.

>>>

>>> word[:2] # character from the beginning to position 2 (excluded)

'Py'

>>> word[4:] # characters from position 4 (included) to the end

'on'

>>> word[-2:] # characters from the second-last (included) to the end

'on'

Note how the start is always included, and the end always excluded. This makes sure
that s[:i] + s[i:] is always equal to s:
>>>

>>> word[:2] + word[2:]

'Python'

>>> word[:4] + word[4:]

'Python'

One way to remember how slices work is to think of the indices as pointing between characters, with
the left edge of the first character numbered 0. Then the right edge of the last character of a string
of n characters has index n, for example:

+---+---+---+---+---+---+

|P|y|t|h|o|n|

+---+---+---+---+---+---+

0 1 2 3 4 5 6

-6 -5 -4 -3 -2 -1

The first row of numbers gives the position of the indices 0…6 in the string; the second row gives the
corresponding negative indices. The slice from i to j consists of all characters between the edges
labeled i and j, respectively.

For non-negative indices, the length of a slice is the difference of the indices, if both are within
bounds. For example, the length of word[1:3] is 2.

Attempting to use an index that is too large will result in an error:

>>>

>>> word[42] # the word only has 6 characters

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

IndexError: string index out of range

However, out of range slice indexes are handled gracefully when used for slicing:

>>>

>>> word[4:42]

'on'

>>> word[42:]

''

Python strings cannot be changed — they are immutable. Therefore, assigning to an indexed position
in the string results in an error:

>>>
>>> word[0] = 'J'

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

TypeError: 'str' object does not support item assignment

>>> word[2:] = 'py'

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

TypeError: 'str' object does not support item assignment

If you need a different string, you should create a new one:

>>>

>>> 'J' + word[1:]

'Jython'

>>> word[:2] + 'py'

'Pypy'

The built-in function len() returns the length of a string:

>>>

>>> s = 'supercalifragilisticexpialidocious'

>>> len(s)

34

See also

Text Sequence Type — str

Strings are examples of sequence types, and support the common operations supported by such
types.

String Methods

Strings support a large number of methods for basic transformations and searching.

f-strings

String literals that have embedded expressions.

Format String Syntax

Information about string formatting with str.format().

printf-style String Formatting

The old formatting operations invoked when strings are the left operand of the % operator are
described in more detail here.
3.1.3. Lists

Python knows a number of compound data types, used to group together other values. The most
versatile is the list, which can be written as a list of comma-separated values (items) between square
brackets. Lists might contain items of different types, but usually the items all have the same type.

>>>

>>> squares = [1, 4, 9, 16, 25]

>>> squares

[1, 4, 9, 16, 25]

Like strings (and all other built-in sequence types), lists can be indexed and sliced:

>>>

>>> squares[0] # indexing returns the item

>>> squares[-1]

25

>>> squares[-3:] # slicing returns a new list

[9, 16, 25]

Lists also support operations like concatenation:

>>>

>>> squares + [36, 49, 64, 81, 100]

[1, 4, 9, 16, 25, 36, 49, 64, 81, 100]

Unlike strings, which are immutable, lists are a mutable type, i.e. it is possible to change their
content:

>>>

>>> cubes = [1, 8, 27, 65, 125] # something's wrong here

>>> 4 ** 3 # the cube of 4 is 64, not 65!

64

>>> cubes[3] = 64 # replace the wrong value

>>> cubes

[1, 8, 27, 64, 125]

You can also add new items at the end of the list, by using the list.append() method (we will see
more about methods later):

>>>
>>> cubes.append(216) # add the cube of 6

>>> cubes.append(7 ** 3) # and the cube of 7

>>> cubes

[1, 8, 27, 64, 125, 216, 343]

Simple assignment in Python never copies data. When you assign a list to a variable, the variable
refers to the existing list. Any changes you make to the list through one variable will be seen through
all other variables that refer to it.:

>>>

>>> rgb = ["Red", "Green", "Blue"]

>>> rgba = rgb

>>> id(rgb) == id(rgba) # they reference the same object

True

>>> rgba.append("Alph")

>>> rgb

["Red", "Green", "Blue", "Alph"]

All slice operations return a new list containing the requested elements. This means that the
following slice returns a shallow copy of the list:

>>>

>>> correct_rgba = rgba[:]

>>> correct_rgba[-1] = "Alpha"

>>> correct_rgba

["Red", "Green", "Blue", "Alpha"]

>>> rgba

["Red", "Green", "Blue", "Alph"]

Assignment to slices is also possible, and this can even change the size of the list or clear it entirely:

>>>

>>> letters = ['a', 'b', 'c', 'd', 'e', 'f', 'g']

>>> letters

['a', 'b', 'c', 'd', 'e', 'f', 'g']

>>> # replace some values

>>> letters[2:5] = ['C', 'D', 'E']

>>> letters
['a', 'b', 'C', 'D', 'E', 'f', 'g']

>>> # now remove them

>>> letters[2:5] = []

>>> letters

['a', 'b', 'f', 'g']

>>> # clear the list by replacing all the elements with an empty list

>>> letters[:] = []

>>> letters

[]

The built-in function len() also applies to lists:

>>>

>>> letters = ['a', 'b', 'c', 'd']

>>> len(letters)

It is possible to nest lists (create lists containing other lists), for example:

>>>

>>> a = ['a', 'b', 'c']

>>> n = [1, 2, 3]

>>> x = [a, n]

>>> x

[['a', 'b', 'c'], [1, 2, 3]]

>>> x[0]

['a', 'b', 'c']

>>> x[0][1]

'b'

3.2. First Steps Towards Programming

Of course, we can use Python for more complicated tasks than adding two and two together. For
instance, we can write an initial sub-sequence of the Fibonacci series as follows:

>>>

>>> # Fibonacci series:

>>> # the sum of two elements defines the next

>>> a, b = 0, 1

>>> while a < 10:

... print(a)

... a, b = b, a+b

...

This example introduces several new features.

 The first line contains a multiple assignment: the variables a and b simultaneously get the
new values 0 and 1. On the last line this is used again, demonstrating that the expressions on
the right-hand side are all evaluated first before any of the assignments take place. The right-
hand side expressions are evaluated from the left to the right.

 The while loop executes as long as the condition (here: a < 10) remains true. In Python, like
in C, any non-zero integer value is true; zero is false. The condition may also be a string or list
value, in fact any sequence; anything with a non-zero length is true, empty sequences are
false. The test used in the example is a simple comparison. The standard comparison
operators are written the same as in C: < (less than), > (greater than), == (equal to), <= (less
than or equal to), >= (greater than or equal to) and != (not equal to).

 The body of the loop is indented: indentation is Python’s way of grouping statements. At the
interactive prompt, you have to type a tab or space(s) for each indented line. In practice you
will prepare more complicated input for Python with a text editor; all decent text editors
have an auto-indent facility. When a compound statement is entered interactively, it must be
followed by a blank line to indicate completion (since the parser cannot guess when you
have typed the last line). Note that each line within a basic block must be indented by the
same amount.

 The print() function writes the value of the argument(s) it is given. It differs from just writing
the expression you want to write (as we did earlier in the calculator examples) in the way it
handles multiple arguments, floating-point quantities, and strings. Strings are printed
without quotes, and a space is inserted between items, so you can format things nicely, like
this:

>>>

>>> i = 256*256
>>> print('The value of i is', i)

The value of i is 65536

The keyword argument end can be used to avoid the newline after the output, or end the output
with a different string:

>>>

>>> a, b = 0, 1

>>> while a < 1000:

... print(a, end=',')

... a, b = b, a+b

...

0,1,1,2,3,5,8,13,21,34,55,89,144,233,377,610,987,

Footnotes

[1]

Since ** has higher precedence than -, -3**2 will be interpreted as -(3**2) and thus result in -9. To
avoid this and get 9, you can use (-3)**2.

[2]

Unlike other languages, special characters such as \n have the same meaning with both single ('...')
and double ("...") quotes. The only difference between the two is that within single quotes you don’t
need to escape " (but you have to escape \') and vice versa.

3.1. Using Python as a Calculator

Let’s try some simple Python commands. Start the interpreter and wait for the primary prompt, >>>.
(It shouldn’t take long.)

3.1.1. Numbers

The interpreter acts as a simple calculator: you can type an expression at it and it will write the value.
Expression syntax is straightforward: the operators +, -, * and / can be used to perform arithmetic;
parentheses (()) can be used for grouping. For example:

>>>

>>> 2 + 2

>>> 50 - 5*6

20

>>> (50 - 5*6) / 4

5.0

>>> 8 / 5 # division always returns a floating-point number

1.6

The integer numbers (e.g. 2, 4, 20) have type int, the ones with a fractional part (e.g. 5.0, 1.6) have
type float. We will see more about numeric types later in the tutorial.

Division (/) always returns a float. To do floor division and get an integer result you can use
the // operator; to calculate the remainder you can use %:

>>>

>>> 17 / 3 # classic division returns a float

5.666666666666667

>>>

>>> 17 // 3 # floor division discards the fractional part

>>> 17 % 3 # the % operator returns the remainder of the division

>>> 5 * 3 + 2 # floored quotient * divisor + remainder

17

With Python, it is possible to use the ** operator to calculate powers [1]:

>>>

>>> 5 ** 2 # 5 squared

25

>>> 2 ** 7 # 2 to the power of 7

128

The equal sign (=) is used to assign a value to a variable. Afterwards, no result is displayed before the
next interactive prompt:

>>>

>>> width = 20

>>> height = 5 * 9

>>> width * height

900

If a variable is not “defined” (assigned a value), trying to use it will give you an error:

>>>
>>> n # try to access an undefined variable

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

NameError: name 'n' is not defined

There is full support for floating point; operators with mixed type operands convert the integer
operand to floating point:

>>>

>>> 4 * 3.75 - 1

14.0

In interactive mode, the last printed expression is assigned to the variable _. This means that when
you are using Python as a desk calculator, it is somewhat easier to continue calculations, for example:

>>>

>>> tax = 12.5 / 100

>>> price = 100.50

>>> price * tax

12.5625

>>> price + _

113.0625

>>> round(_, 2)

113.06

This variable should be treated as read-only by the user. Don’t explicitly assign a value to it — you
would create an independent local variable with the same name masking the built-in variable with its
magic behavior.

In addition to int and float, Python supports other types of numbers, such as Decimal and Fraction.
Python also has built-in support for complex numbers, and uses the j or J suffix to indicate the
imaginary part (e.g. 3+5j).

3.1.2. Text

Python can manipulate text (represented by type str, so-called “strings”) as well as numbers. This
includes characters “!”, words “rabbit”, names “Paris”, sentences “Got your back.”, etc. “Yay! :)”. They
can be enclosed in single quotes ('...') or double quotes ("...") with the same result [2].

>>>

>>> 'spam eggs' # single quotes

'spam eggs'

>>> "Paris rabbit got your back :)! Yay!" # double quotes
'Paris rabbit got your back :)! Yay!'

>>> '1975' # digits and numerals enclosed in quotes are also strings

'1975'

To quote a quote, we need to “escape” it, by preceding it with \. Alternatively, we can use the other
type of quotation marks:

>>>

>>> 'doesn\'t' # use \' to escape the single quote...

"doesn't"

>>> "doesn't" # ...or use double quotes instead

"doesn't"

>>> '"Yes," they said.'

'"Yes," they said.'

>>> "\"Yes,\" they said."

'"Yes," they said.'

>>> '"Isn\'t," they said.'

'"Isn\'t," they said.'

In the Python shell, the string definition and output string can look different. The print() function
produces a more readable output, by omitting the enclosing quotes and by printing escaped and
special characters:

>>>

>>> s = 'First line.\nSecond line.' # \n means newline

>>> s # without print(), special characters are included in the string

'First line.\nSecond line.'

>>> print(s) # with print(), special characters are interpreted, so \n produces new line

First line.

Second line.

If you don’t want characters prefaced by \ to be interpreted as special characters, you can use raw
strings by adding an r before the first quote:

>>>

>>> print('C:\some\name') # here \n means newline!

C:\some

ame
>>> print(r'C:\some\name') # note the r before the quote

C:\some\name

There is one subtle aspect to raw strings: a raw string may not end in an odd number of \ characters;
see the FAQ entry for more information and workarounds.

String literals can span multiple lines. One way is using triple-quotes: """...""" or '''...'''. End of lines
are automatically included in the string, but it’s possible to prevent this by adding a \ at the end of
the line. In the following example, the initial newline is not included:

>>>

>>> print("""\

... Usage: thingy [OPTIONS]

... -h Display this usage message

... -H hostname Hostname to connect to

... """)

Usage: thingy [OPTIONS]

-h Display this usage message

-H hostname Hostname to connect to

>>>

Strings can be concatenated (glued together) with the + operator, and repeated with *:

>>>

>>> # 3 times 'un', followed by 'ium'

>>> 3 * 'un' + 'ium'

'unununium'

Two or more string literals (i.e. the ones enclosed between quotes) next to each other are
automatically concatenated.

>>>

>>> 'Py' 'thon'

'Python'

This feature is particularly useful when you want to break long strings:

>>>

>>> text = ('Put several strings within parentheses '

... 'to have them joined together.')

>>> text

'Put several strings within parentheses to have them joined together.'

This only works with two literals though, not with variables or expressions:

>>>

>>> prefix = 'Py'

>>> prefix 'thon' # can't concatenate a variable and a string literal

File "<stdin>", line 1

prefix 'thon'

^^^^^^

SyntaxError: invalid syntax

>>> ('un' * 3) 'ium'

File "<stdin>", line 1

('un' * 3) 'ium'

^^^^^

SyntaxError: invalid syntax

If you want to concatenate variables or a variable and a literal, use +:

>>>

>>> prefix + 'thon'

'Python'

Strings can be indexed (subscripted), with the first character having index 0. There is no separate
character type; a character is simply a string of size one:

>>>

>>> word = 'Python'

>>> word[0] # character in position 0

'P'

>>> word[5] # character in position 5

'n'

Indices may also be negative numbers, to start counting from the right:

>>>

>>> word[-1] # last character

'n'
>>> word[-2] # second-last character

'o'

>>> word[-6]

'P'

Note that since -0 is the same as 0, negative indices start from -1.

In addition to indexing, slicing is also supported. While indexing is used to obtain individual
characters, slicing allows you to obtain a substring:

>>>

>>> word[0:2] # characters from position 0 (included) to 2 (excluded)

'Py'

>>> word[2:5] # characters from position 2 (included) to 5 (excluded)

'tho'

Slice indices have useful defaults; an omitted first index defaults to zero, an omitted second index
defaults to the size of the string being sliced.

>>>

>>> word[:2] # character from the beginning to position 2 (excluded)

'Py'

>>> word[4:] # characters from position 4 (included) to the end

'on'

>>> word[-2:] # characters from the second-last (included) to the end

'on'

Note how the start is always included, and the end always excluded. This makes sure
that s[:i] + s[i:] is always equal to s:

>>>

>>> word[:2] + word[2:]

'Python'

>>> word[:4] + word[4:]

'Python'

One way to remember how slices work is to think of the indices as pointing between characters, with
the left edge of the first character numbered 0. Then the right edge of the last character of a string
of n characters has index n, for example:

+---+---+---+---+---+---+

|P|y|t|h|o|n|
 +---+---+---+---+---+---+

0 1 2 3 4 5 6

-6 -5 -4 -3 -2 -1

The first row of numbers gives the position of the indices 0…6 in the string; the second row gives the
corresponding negative indices. The slice from i to j consists of all characters between the edges
labeled i and j, respectively.

For non-negative indices, the length of a slice is the difference of the indices, if both are within
bounds. For example, the length of word[1:3] is 2.

Attempting to use an index that is too large will result in an error:

>>>

>>> word[42] # the word only has 6 characters

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

IndexError: string index out of range

However, out of range slice indexes are handled gracefully when used for slicing:

>>>

>>> word[4:42]

'on'

>>> word[42:]

''

Python strings cannot be changed — they are immutable. Therefore, assigning to an indexed position
in the string results in an error:

>>>

>>> word[0] = 'J'

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

TypeError: 'str' object does not support item assignment

>>> word[2:] = 'py'

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

TypeError: 'str' object does not support item assignment

If you need a different string, you should create a new one:

>>>

>>> 'J' + word[1:]

'Jython'

>>> word[:2] + 'py'

'Pypy'

The built-in function len() returns the length of a string:

>>>

>>> s = 'supercalifragilisticexpialidocious'

>>> len(s)

34

See also

Text Sequence Type — str

Strings are examples of sequence types, and support the common operations supported by such
types.

String Methods

Strings support a large number of methods for basic transformations and searching.

f-strings

String literals that have embedded expressions.

Format String Syntax

Information about string formatting with str.format().

printf-style String Formatting

The old formatting operations invoked when strings are the left operand of the % operator are
described in more detail here.

3.1.3. Lists

Python knows a number of compound data types, used to group together other values. The most
versatile is the list, which can be written as a list of comma-separated values (items) between square
brackets. Lists might contain items of different types, but usually the items all have the same type.

>>>

>>> squares = [1, 4, 9, 16, 25]

>>> squares

[1, 4, 9, 16, 25]

Like strings (and all other built-in sequence types), lists can be indexed and sliced:
>>>

>>> squares[0] # indexing returns the item

>>> squares[-1]

25

>>> squares[-3:] # slicing returns a new list

[9, 16, 25]

Lists also support operations like concatenation:

>>>

>>> squares + [36, 49, 64, 81, 100]

[1, 4, 9, 16, 25, 36, 49, 64, 81, 100]

Unlike strings, which are immutable, lists are a mutable type, i.e. it is possible to change their
content:

>>>

>>> cubes = [1, 8, 27, 65, 125] # something's wrong here

>>> 4 ** 3 # the cube of 4 is 64, not 65!

64

>>> cubes[3] = 64 # replace the wrong value

>>> cubes

[1, 8, 27, 64, 125]

You can also add new items at the end of the list, by using the list.append() method (we will see
more about methods later):

>>>

>>> cubes.append(216) # add the cube of 6

>>> cubes.append(7 ** 3) # and the cube of 7

>>> cubes

[1, 8, 27, 64, 125, 216, 343]

Simple assignment in Python never copies data. When you assign a list to a variable, the variable
refers to the existing list. Any changes you make to the list through one variable will be seen through
all other variables that refer to it.:

>>>

>>> rgb = ["Red", "Green", "Blue"]

>>> rgba = rgb

>>> id(rgb) == id(rgba) # they reference the same object

True

>>> rgba.append("Alph")

>>> rgb

["Red", "Green", "Blue", "Alph"]

All slice operations return a new list containing the requested elements. This means that the
following slice returns a shallow copy of the list:

>>>

>>> correct_rgba = rgba[:]

>>> correct_rgba[-1] = "Alpha"

>>> correct_rgba

["Red", "Green", "Blue", "Alpha"]

>>> rgba

["Red", "Green", "Blue", "Alph"]

Assignment to slices is also possible, and this can even change the size of the list or clear it entirely:

>>>

>>> letters = ['a', 'b', 'c', 'd', 'e', 'f', 'g']

>>> letters

['a', 'b', 'c', 'd', 'e', 'f', 'g']

>>> # replace some values

>>> letters[2:5] = ['C', 'D', 'E']

>>> letters

['a', 'b', 'C', 'D', 'E', 'f', 'g']

>>> # now remove them

>>> letters[2:5] = []

>>> letters

['a', 'b', 'f', 'g']

>>> # clear the list by replacing all the elements with an empty list

>>> letters[:] = []

>>> letters
[]

The built-in function len() also applies to lists:

>>>

>>> letters = ['a', 'b', 'c', 'd']

>>> len(letters)

It is possible to nest lists (create lists containing other lists), for example:

>>>

>>> a = ['a', 'b', 'c']

>>> n = [1, 2, 3]

>>> x = [a, n]

>>> x

[['a', 'b', 'c'], [1, 2, 3]]

>>> x[0]

['a', 'b', 'c']

>>> x[0][1]

'b'

3.2. First Steps Towards Programming

Of course, we can use Python for more complicated tasks than adding two and two together. For
instance, we can write an initial sub-sequence of the Fibonacci series as follows:

>>>

>>> # Fibonacci series:

>>> # the sum of two elements defines the next

>>> a, b = 0, 1

>>> while a < 10:

... print(a)

... a, b = b, a+b

...

1
2

This example introduces several new features.

 The first line contains a multiple assignment: the variables a and b simultaneously get the
new values 0 and 1. On the last line this is used again, demonstrating that the expressions on
the right-hand side are all evaluated first before any of the assignments take place. The right-
hand side expressions are evaluated from the left to the right.

 The while loop executes as long as the condition (here: a < 10) remains true. In Python, like
in C, any non-zero integer value is true; zero is false. The condition may also be a string or list
value, in fact any sequence; anything with a non-zero length is true, empty sequences are
false. The test used in the example is a simple comparison. The standard comparison
operators are written the same as in C: < (less than), > (greater than), == (equal to), <= (less
than or equal to), >= (greater than or equal to) and != (not equal to).

 The body of the loop is indented: indentation is Python’s way of grouping statements. At the
interactive prompt, you have to type a tab or space(s) for each indented line. In practice you
will prepare more complicated input for Python with a text editor; all decent text editors
have an auto-indent facility. When a compound statement is entered interactively, it must be
followed by a blank line to indicate completion (since the parser cannot guess when you
have typed the last line). Note that each line within a basic block must be indented by the
same amount.

 The print() function writes the value of the argument(s) it is given. It differs from just writing
the expression you want to write (as we did earlier in the calculator examples) in the way it
handles multiple arguments, floating-point quantities, and strings. Strings are printed
without quotes, and a space is inserted between items, so you can format things nicely, like
this:

>>>

>>> i = 256*256

>>> print('The value of i is', i)

The value of i is 65536

The keyword argument end can be used to avoid the newline after the output, or end the output
with a different string:

>>>

>>> a, b = 0, 1

>>> while a < 1000:

... print(a, end=',')

... a, b = b, a+b
...

0,1,1,2,3,5,8,13,21,34,55,89,144,233,377,610,987,

Footnotes

[1]

Since ** has higher precedence than -, -3**2 will be interpreted as -(3**2) and thus result in -9. To
avoid this and get 9, you can use (-3)**2.

[2]

Unlike other languages, special characters such as \n have the same meaning with both single ('...')
and double ("...") quotes. The only difference between the two is that within single quotes you don’t
need to escape " (but you have to escape \') and vice versa.

3.1.1. Numbers

The interpreter acts as a simple calculator: you can type an expression at it and it will write the value.
Expression syntax is straightforward: the operators +, -, * and / can be used to perform arithmetic;
parentheses (()) can be used for grouping. For example:

>>>

>>> 2 + 2

>>> 50 - 5*6

20

>>> (50 - 5*6) / 4

5.0

>>> 8 / 5 # division always returns a floating-point number

1.6

The integer numbers (e.g. 2, 4, 20) have type int, the ones with a fractional part (e.g. 5.0, 1.6) have
type float. We will see more about numeric types later in the tutorial.

Division (/) always returns a float. To do floor division and get an integer result you can use
the // operator; to calculate the remainder you can use %:

>>>

>>> 17 / 3 # classic division returns a float

5.666666666666667

>>>

>>> 17 // 3 # floor division discards the fractional part

5

>>> 17 % 3 # the % operator returns the remainder of the division

>>> 5 * 3 + 2 # floored quotient * divisor + remainder

17

With Python, it is possible to use the ** operator to calculate powers [1]:

>>>

>>> 5 ** 2 # 5 squared

25

>>> 2 ** 7 # 2 to the power of 7

128

The equal sign (=) is used to assign a value to a variable. Afterwards, no result is displayed before the
next interactive prompt:

>>>

>>> width = 20

>>> height = 5 * 9

>>> width * height

900

If a variable is not “defined” (assigned a value), trying to use it will give you an error:

>>>

>>> n # try to access an undefined variable

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

NameError: name 'n' is not defined

There is full support for floating point; operators with mixed type operands convert the integer
operand to floating point:

>>>

>>> 4 * 3.75 - 1

14.0

In interactive mode, the last printed expression is assigned to the variable _. This means that when
you are using Python as a desk calculator, it is somewhat easier to continue calculations, for example:

>>>
>>> tax = 12.5 / 100

>>> price = 100.50

>>> price * tax

12.5625

>>> price + _

113.0625

>>> round(_, 2)

113.06

This variable should be treated as read-only by the user. Don’t explicitly assign a value to it — you
would create an independent local variable with the same name masking the built-in variable with its
magic behavior.

In addition to int and float, Python supports other types of numbers, such as Decimal and Fraction.
Python also has built-in support for complex numbers, and uses the j or J suffix to indicate the
imaginary part (e.g. 3+5j).

3.1.2. Text

Python can manipulate text (represented by type str, so-called “strings”) as well as numbers. This
includes characters “!”, words “rabbit”, names “Paris”, sentences “Got your back.”, etc. “Yay! :)”. They
can be enclosed in single quotes ('...') or double quotes ("...") with the same result [2].

>>>

>>> 'spam eggs' # single quotes

'spam eggs'

>>> "Paris rabbit got your back :)! Yay!" # double quotes

'Paris rabbit got your back :)! Yay!'

>>> '1975' # digits and numerals enclosed in quotes are also strings

'1975'

To quote a quote, we need to “escape” it, by preceding it with \. Alternatively, we can use the other
type of quotation marks:

>>>

>>> 'doesn\'t' # use \' to escape the single quote...

"doesn't"

>>> "doesn't" # ...or use double quotes instead

"doesn't"

>>> '"Yes," they said.'

'"Yes," they said.'

>>> "\"Yes,\" they said."

'"Yes," they said.'

>>> '"Isn\'t," they said.'

'"Isn\'t," they said.'

In the Python shell, the string definition and output string can look different. The print() function
produces a more readable output, by omitting the enclosing quotes and by printing escaped and
special characters:

>>>

>>> s = 'First line.\nSecond line.' # \n means newline

>>> s # without print(), special characters are included in the string

'First line.\nSecond line.'

>>> print(s) # with print(), special characters are interpreted, so \n produces new line

First line.

Second line.

If you don’t want characters prefaced by \ to be interpreted as special characters, you can use raw
strings by adding an r before the first quote:

>>>

>>> print('C:\some\name') # here \n means newline!

C:\some

ame

>>> print(r'C:\some\name') # note the r before the quote

C:\some\name

There is one subtle aspect to raw strings: a raw string may not end in an odd number of \ characters;
see the FAQ entry for more information and workarounds.

String literals can span multiple lines. One way is using triple-quotes: """...""" or '''...'''. End of lines
are automatically included in the string, but it’s possible to prevent this by adding a \ at the end of
the line. In the following example, the initial newline is not included:

>>>

>>> print("""\

... Usage: thingy [OPTIONS]

... -h Display this usage message

... -H hostname Hostname to connect to

... """)

Usage: thingy [OPTIONS]

-h Display this usage message

-H hostname Hostname to connect to

>>>

Strings can be concatenated (glued together) with the + operator, and repeated with *:

>>>

>>> # 3 times 'un', followed by 'ium'

>>> 3 * 'un' + 'ium'

'unununium'

Two or more string literals (i.e. the ones enclosed between quotes) next to each other are
automatically concatenated.

>>>

>>> 'Py' 'thon'

'Python'

This feature is particularly useful when you want to break long strings:

>>>

>>> text = ('Put several strings within parentheses '

... 'to have them joined together.')

>>> text

'Put several strings within parentheses to have them joined together.'

This only works with two literals though, not with variables or expressions:

>>>

>>> prefix = 'Py'

>>> prefix 'thon' # can't concatenate a variable and a string literal

File "<stdin>", line 1

prefix 'thon'

^^^^^^

SyntaxError: invalid syntax

>>> ('un' * 3) 'ium'

 File "<stdin>", line 1

('un' * 3) 'ium'

^^^^^

SyntaxError: invalid syntax

If you want to concatenate variables or a variable and a literal, use +:

>>>

>>> prefix + 'thon'

'Python'

Strings can be indexed (subscripted), with the first character having index 0. There is no separate
character type; a character is simply a string of size one:

>>>

>>> word = 'Python'

>>> word[0] # character in position 0

'P'

>>> word[5] # character in position 5

'n'

Indices may also be negative numbers, to start counting from the right:

>>>

>>> word[-1] # last character

'n'

>>> word[-2] # second-last character

'o'

>>> word[-6]

'P'

Note that since -0 is the same as 0, negative indices start from -1.

In addition to indexing, slicing is also supported. While indexing is used to obtain individual
characters, slicing allows you to obtain a substring:

>>>

>>> word[0:2] # characters from position 0 (included) to 2 (excluded)

'Py'

>>> word[2:5] # characters from position 2 (included) to 5 (excluded)

'tho'
Slice indices have useful defaults; an omitted first index defaults to zero, an omitted second index
defaults to the size of the string being sliced.

>>>

>>> word[:2] # character from the beginning to position 2 (excluded)

'Py'

>>> word[4:] # characters from position 4 (included) to the end

'on'

>>> word[-2:] # characters from the second-last (included) to the end

'on'

Note how the start is always included, and the end always excluded. This makes sure
that s[:i] + s[i:] is always equal to s:

>>>

>>> word[:2] + word[2:]

'Python'

>>> word[:4] + word[4:]

'Python'

One way to remember how slices work is to think of the indices as pointing between characters, with
the left edge of the first character numbered 0. Then the right edge of the last character of a string
of n characters has index n, for example:

+---+---+---+---+---+---+

|P|y|t|h|o|n|

+---+---+---+---+---+---+

0 1 2 3 4 5 6

-6 -5 -4 -3 -2 -1

The first row of numbers gives the position of the indices 0…6 in the string; the second row gives the
corresponding negative indices. The slice from i to j consists of all characters between the edges
labeled i and j, respectively.

For non-negative indices, the length of a slice is the difference of the indices, if both are within
bounds. For example, the length of word[1:3] is 2.

Attempting to use an index that is too large will result in an error:

>>>

>>> word[42] # the word only has 6 characters

Traceback (most recent call last):

 File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

IndexError: string index out of range

However, out of range slice indexes are handled gracefully when used for slicing:

>>>

>>> word[4:42]

'on'

>>> word[42:]

''

Python strings cannot be changed — they are immutable. Therefore, assigning to an indexed position
in the string results in an error:

>>>

>>> word[0] = 'J'

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

TypeError: 'str' object does not support item assignment

>>> word[2:] = 'py'

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

TypeError: 'str' object does not support item assignment

If you need a different string, you should create a new one:

>>>

>>> 'J' + word[1:]

'Jython'

>>> word[:2] + 'py'

'Pypy'

The built-in function len() returns the length of a string:

>>>

>>> s = 'supercalifragilisticexpialidocious'

>>> len(s)

34

See also
Text Sequence Type — str

Strings are examples of sequence types, and support the common operations supported by such
types.

String Methods

Strings support a large number of methods for basic transformations and searching.

f-strings

String literals that have embedded expressions.

Format String Syntax

Information about string formatting with str.format().

printf-style String Formatting

The old formatting operations invoked when strings are the left operand of the % operator are
described in more detail here.

3.1.3. Lists

Python knows a number of compound data types, used to group together other values. The most
versatile is the list, which can be written as a list of comma-separated values (items) between square
brackets. Lists might contain items of different types, but usually the items all have the same type.

>>>

>>> squares = [1, 4, 9, 16, 25]

>>> squares

[1, 4, 9, 16, 25]

Like strings (and all other built-in sequence types), lists can be indexed and sliced:

>>>

>>> squares[0] # indexing returns the item

>>> squares[-1]

25

>>> squares[-3:] # slicing returns a new list

[9, 16, 25]

Lists also support operations like concatenation:

>>>

>>> squares + [36, 49, 64, 81, 100]

[1, 4, 9, 16, 25, 36, 49, 64, 81, 100]

Unlike strings, which are immutable, lists are a mutable type, i.e. it is possible to change their
content:

>>>

>>> cubes = [1, 8, 27, 65, 125] # something's wrong here

>>> 4 ** 3 # the cube of 4 is 64, not 65!

64

>>> cubes[3] = 64 # replace the wrong value

>>> cubes

[1, 8, 27, 64, 125]

You can also add new items at the end of the list, by using the list.append() method (we will see
more about methods later):

>>>

>>> cubes.append(216) # add the cube of 6

>>> cubes.append(7 ** 3) # and the cube of 7

>>> cubes

[1, 8, 27, 64, 125, 216, 343]

Simple assignment in Python never copies data. When you assign a list to a variable, the variable
refers to the existing list. Any changes you make to the list through one variable will be seen through
all other variables that refer to it.:

>>>

>>> rgb = ["Red", "Green", "Blue"]

>>> rgba = rgb

>>> id(rgb) == id(rgba) # they reference the same object

True

>>> rgba.append("Alph")

>>> rgb

["Red", "Green", "Blue", "Alph"]

All slice operations return a new list containing the requested elements. This means that the
following slice returns a shallow copy of the list:

>>>

>>> correct_rgba = rgba[:]

>>> correct_rgba[-1] = "Alpha"

>>> correct_rgba
["Red", "Green", "Blue", "Alpha"]

>>> rgba

["Red", "Green", "Blue", "Alph"]

Assignment to slices is also possible, and this can even change the size of the list or clear it entirely:

>>>

>>> letters = ['a', 'b', 'c', 'd', 'e', 'f', 'g']

>>> letters

['a', 'b', 'c', 'd', 'e', 'f', 'g']

>>> # replace some values

>>> letters[2:5] = ['C', 'D', 'E']

>>> letters

['a', 'b', 'C', 'D', 'E', 'f', 'g']

>>> # now remove them

>>> letters[2:5] = []

>>> letters

['a', 'b', 'f', 'g']

>>> # clear the list by replacing all the elements with an empty list

>>> letters[:] = []

>>> letters

[]

The built-in function len() also applies to lists:

>>>

>>> letters = ['a', 'b', 'c', 'd']

>>> len(letters)

It is possible to nest lists (create lists containing other lists), for example:

>>>

>>> a = ['a', 'b', 'c']

>>> n = [1, 2, 3]

>>> x = [a, n]

>>> x
[['a', 'b', 'c'], [1, 2, 3]]

>>> x[0]

['a', 'b', 'c']

>>> x[0][1]

'b'

3.2. First Steps Towards Programming

Of course, we can use Python for more complicated tasks than adding two and two together. For
instance, we can write an initial sub-sequence of the Fibonacci series as follows:

>>>

>>> # Fibonacci series:

>>> # the sum of two elements defines the next

>>> a, b = 0, 1

>>> while a < 10:

... print(a)

... a, b = b, a+b

...

This example introduces several new features.

 The first line contains a multiple assignment: the variables a and b simultaneously get the
new values 0 and 1. On the last line this is used again, demonstrating that the expressions on
the right-hand side are all evaluated first before any of the assignments take place. The right-
hand side expressions are evaluated from the left to the right.

 The while loop executes as long as the condition (here: a < 10) remains true. In Python, like
in C, any non-zero integer value is true; zero is false. The condition may also be a string or list
value, in fact any sequence; anything with a non-zero length is true, empty sequences are
false. The test used in the example is a simple comparison. The standard comparison
operators are written the same as in C: < (less than), > (greater than), == (equal to), <= (less
than or equal to), >= (greater than or equal to) and != (not equal to).
  The body of the loop is indented: indentation is Python’s way of grouping statements. At the
interactive prompt, you have to type a tab or space(s) for each indented line. In practice you
will prepare more complicated input for Python with a text editor; all decent text editors
have an auto-indent facility. When a compound statement is entered interactively, it must be
followed by a blank line to indicate completion (since the parser cannot guess when you
have typed the last line). Note that each line within a basic block must be indented by the
same amount.

 The print() function writes the value of the argument(s) it is given. It differs from just writing
the expression you want to write (as we did earlier in the calculator examples) in the way it
handles multiple arguments, floating-point quantities, and strings. Strings are printed
without quotes, and a space is inserted between items, so you can format things nicely, like
this:

>>>

>>> i = 256*256

>>> print('The value of i is', i)

The value of i is 65536

The keyword argument end can be used to avoid the newline after the output, or end the output
with a different string:

>>>

>>> a, b = 0, 1

>>> while a < 1000:

... print(a, end=',')

... a, b = b, a+b

...

0,1,1,2,3,5,8,13,21,34,55,89,144,233,377,610,987,

Footnotes

[1]

Since ** has higher precedence than -, -3**2 will be interpreted as -(3**2) and thus result in -9. To
avoid this and get 9, you can use (-3)**2.

[2]

Unlike other languages, special characters such as \n have the same meaning with both single ('...')
and double ("...") quotes. The only difference between the two is that within single quotes you don’t
need to escape " (but you have to escape \') and vice versa.

3.1.2. Text
Python can manipulate text (represented by type str, so-called “strings”) as well as numbers. This
includes characters “!”, words “rabbit”, names “Paris”, sentences “Got your back.”, etc. “Yay! :)”. They
can be enclosed in single quotes ('...') or double quotes ("...") with the same result [2].

>>>

>>> 'spam eggs' # single quotes

'spam eggs'

>>> "Paris rabbit got your back :)! Yay!" # double quotes

'Paris rabbit got your back :)! Yay!'

>>> '1975' # digits and numerals enclosed in quotes are also strings

'1975'

To quote a quote, we need to “escape” it, by preceding it with \. Alternatively, we can use the other
type of quotation marks:

>>>

>>> 'doesn\'t' # use \' to escape the single quote...

"doesn't"

>>> "doesn't" # ...or use double quotes instead

"doesn't"

>>> '"Yes," they said.'

'"Yes," they said.'

>>> "\"Yes,\" they said."

'"Yes," they said.'

>>> '"Isn\'t," they said.'

'"Isn\'t," they said.'

In the Python shell, the string definition and output string can look different. The print() function
produces a more readable output, by omitting the enclosing quotes and by printing escaped and
special characters:

>>>

>>> s = 'First line.\nSecond line.' # \n means newline

>>> s # without print(), special characters are included in the string

'First line.\nSecond line.'

>>> print(s) # with print(), special characters are interpreted, so \n produces new line

First line.

Second line.
If you don’t want characters prefaced by \ to be interpreted as special characters, you can use raw
strings by adding an r before the first quote:

>>>

>>> print('C:\some\name') # here \n means newline!

C:\some

ame

>>> print(r'C:\some\name') # note the r before the quote

C:\some\name

There is one subtle aspect to raw strings: a raw string may not end in an odd number of \ characters;
see the FAQ entry for more information and workarounds.

String literals can span multiple lines. One way is using triple-quotes: """...""" or '''...'''. End of lines
are automatically included in the string, but it’s possible to prevent this by adding a \ at the end of
the line. In the following example, the initial newline is not included:

>>>

>>> print("""\

... Usage: thingy [OPTIONS]

... -h Display this usage message

... -H hostname Hostname to connect to

... """)

Usage: thingy [OPTIONS]

-h Display this usage message

-H hostname Hostname to connect to

>>>

Strings can be concatenated (glued together) with the + operator, and repeated with *:

>>>

>>> # 3 times 'un', followed by 'ium'

>>> 3 * 'un' + 'ium'

'unununium'

Two or more string literals (i.e. the ones enclosed between quotes) next to each other are
automatically concatenated.

>>>

>>> 'Py' 'thon'

'Python'

This feature is particularly useful when you want to break long strings:

>>>

>>> text = ('Put several strings within parentheses '

... 'to have them joined together.')

>>> text

'Put several strings within parentheses to have them joined together.'

This only works with two literals though, not with variables or expressions:

>>>

>>> prefix = 'Py'

>>> prefix 'thon' # can't concatenate a variable and a string literal

File "<stdin>", line 1

prefix 'thon'

^^^^^^

SyntaxError: invalid syntax

>>> ('un' * 3) 'ium'

File "<stdin>", line 1

('un' * 3) 'ium'

^^^^^

SyntaxError: invalid syntax

If you want to concatenate variables or a variable and a literal, use +:

>>>

>>> prefix + 'thon'

'Python'

Strings can be indexed (subscripted), with the first character having index 0. There is no separate
character type; a character is simply a string of size one:

>>>

>>> word = 'Python'

>>> word[0] # character in position 0

'P'

>>> word[5] # character in position 5

'n'

Indices may also be negative numbers, to start counting from the right:

>>>

>>> word[-1] # last character

'n'

>>> word[-2] # second-last character

'o'

>>> word[-6]

'P'

Note that since -0 is the same as 0, negative indices start from -1.

In addition to indexing, slicing is also supported. While indexing is used to obtain individual
characters, slicing allows you to obtain a substring:

>>>

>>> word[0:2] # characters from position 0 (included) to 2 (excluded)

'Py'

>>> word[2:5] # characters from position 2 (included) to 5 (excluded)

'tho'

Slice indices have useful defaults; an omitted first index defaults to zero, an omitted second index
defaults to the size of the string being sliced.

>>>

>>> word[:2] # character from the beginning to position 2 (excluded)

'Py'

>>> word[4:] # characters from position 4 (included) to the end

'on'

>>> word[-2:] # characters from the second-last (included) to the end

'on'

Note how the start is always included, and the end always excluded. This makes sure
that s[:i] + s[i:] is always equal to s:

>>>

>>> word[:2] + word[2:]

'Python'

>>> word[:4] + word[4:]

'Python'

One way to remember how slices work is to think of the indices as pointing between characters, with
the left edge of the first character numbered 0. Then the right edge of the last character of a string
of n characters has index n, for example:

+---+---+---+---+---+---+

|P|y|t|h|o|n|

+---+---+---+---+---+---+

0 1 2 3 4 5 6

-6 -5 -4 -3 -2 -1

The first row of numbers gives the position of the indices 0…6 in the string; the second row gives the
corresponding negative indices. The slice from i to j consists of all characters between the edges
labeled i and j, respectively.

For non-negative indices, the length of a slice is the difference of the indices, if both are within
bounds. For example, the length of word[1:3] is 2.

Attempting to use an index that is too large will result in an error:

>>>

>>> word[42] # the word only has 6 characters

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

IndexError: string index out of range

However, out of range slice indexes are handled gracefully when used for slicing:

>>>

>>> word[4:42]

'on'

>>> word[42:]

''

Python strings cannot be changed — they are immutable. Therefore, assigning to an indexed position
in the string results in an error:

>>>

>>> word[0] = 'J'

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

TypeError: 'str' object does not support item assignment

>>> word[2:] = 'py'

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

TypeError: 'str' object does not support item assignment

If you need a different string, you should create a new one:

>>>

>>> 'J' + word[1:]

'Jython'

>>> word[:2] + 'py'

'Pypy'

The built-in function len() returns the length of a string:

>>>

>>> s = 'supercalifragilisticexpialidocious'

>>> len(s)

34

See also

Text Sequence Type — str

Strings are examples of sequence types, and support the common operations supported by such
types.

String Methods

Strings support a large number of methods for basic transformations and searching.

f-strings

String literals that have embedded expressions.

Format String Syntax

Information about string formatting with str.format().

printf-style String Formatting

The old formatting operations invoked when strings are the left operand of the % operator are
described in more detail here.

3.1.3. Lists

Python knows a number of compound data types, used to group together other values. The most
versatile is the list, which can be written as a list of comma-separated values (items) between square
brackets. Lists might contain items of different types, but usually the items all have the same type.
>>>

>>> squares = [1, 4, 9, 16, 25]

>>> squares

[1, 4, 9, 16, 25]

Like strings (and all other built-in sequence types), lists can be indexed and sliced:

>>>

>>> squares[0] # indexing returns the item

>>> squares[-1]

25

>>> squares[-3:] # slicing returns a new list

[9, 16, 25]

Lists also support operations like concatenation:

>>>

>>> squares + [36, 49, 64, 81, 100]

[1, 4, 9, 16, 25, 36, 49, 64, 81, 100]

Unlike strings, which are immutable, lists are a mutable type, i.e. it is possible to change their
content:

>>>

>>> cubes = [1, 8, 27, 65, 125] # something's wrong here

>>> 4 ** 3 # the cube of 4 is 64, not 65!

64

>>> cubes[3] = 64 # replace the wrong value

>>> cubes

[1, 8, 27, 64, 125]

You can also add new items at the end of the list, by using the list.append() method (we will see
more about methods later):

>>>

>>> cubes.append(216) # add the cube of 6

>>> cubes.append(7 ** 3) # and the cube of 7

>>> cubes

[1, 8, 27, 64, 125, 216, 343]

Simple assignment in Python never copies data. When you assign a list to a variable, the variable
refers to the existing list. Any changes you make to the list through one variable will be seen through
all other variables that refer to it.:

>>>

>>> rgb = ["Red", "Green", "Blue"]

>>> rgba = rgb

>>> id(rgb) == id(rgba) # they reference the same object

True

>>> rgba.append("Alph")

>>> rgb

["Red", "Green", "Blue", "Alph"]

All slice operations return a new list containing the requested elements. This means that the
following slice returns a shallow copy of the list:

>>>

>>> correct_rgba = rgba[:]

>>> correct_rgba[-1] = "Alpha"

>>> correct_rgba

["Red", "Green", "Blue", "Alpha"]

>>> rgba

["Red", "Green", "Blue", "Alph"]

Assignment to slices is also possible, and this can even change the size of the list or clear it entirely:

>>>

>>> letters = ['a', 'b', 'c', 'd', 'e', 'f', 'g']

>>> letters

['a', 'b', 'c', 'd', 'e', 'f', 'g']

>>> # replace some values

>>> letters[2:5] = ['C', 'D', 'E']

>>> letters

['a', 'b', 'C', 'D', 'E', 'f', 'g']

>>> # now remove them

>>> letters[2:5] = []

>>> letters
['a', 'b', 'f', 'g']

>>> # clear the list by replacing all the elements with an empty list

>>> letters[:] = []

>>> letters

[]

The built-in function len() also applies to lists:

>>>

>>> letters = ['a', 'b', 'c', 'd']

>>> len(letters)

It is possible to nest lists (create lists containing other lists), for example:

>>>

>>> a = ['a', 'b', 'c']

>>> n = [1, 2, 3]

>>> x = [a, n]

>>> x

[['a', 'b', 'c'], [1, 2, 3]]

>>> x[0]

['a', 'b', 'c']

>>> x[0][1]

'b'

3.2. First Steps Towards Programming

Of course, we can use Python for more complicated tasks than adding two and two together. For
instance, we can write an initial sub-sequence of the Fibonacci series as follows:

>>>

>>> # Fibonacci series:

>>> # the sum of two elements defines the next

>>> a, b = 0, 1

>>> while a < 10:

... print(a)

... a, b = b, a+b
...

This example introduces several new features.

 The first line contains a multiple assignment: the variables a and b simultaneously get the
new values 0 and 1. On the last line this is used again, demonstrating that the expressions on
the right-hand side are all evaluated first before any of the assignments take place. The right-
hand side expressions are evaluated from the left to the right.

 The while loop executes as long as the condition (here: a < 10) remains true. In Python, like
in C, any non-zero integer value is true; zero is false. The condition may also be a string or list
value, in fact any sequence; anything with a non-zero length is true, empty sequences are
false. The test used in the example is a simple comparison. The standard comparison
operators are written the same as in C: < (less than), > (greater than), == (equal to), <= (less
than or equal to), >= (greater than or equal to) and != (not equal to).

 The body of the loop is indented: indentation is Python’s way of grouping statements. At the
interactive prompt, you have to type a tab or space(s) for each indented line. In practice you
will prepare more complicated input for Python with a text editor; all decent text editors
have an auto-indent facility. When a compound statement is entered interactively, it must be
followed by a blank line to indicate completion (since the parser cannot guess when you
have typed the last line). Note that each line within a basic block must be indented by the
same amount.

 The print() function writes the value of the argument(s) it is given. It differs from just writing
the expression you want to write (as we did earlier in the calculator examples) in the way it
handles multiple arguments, floating-point quantities, and strings. Strings are printed
without quotes, and a space is inserted between items, so you can format things nicely, like
this:

>>>

>>> i = 256*256

>>> print('The value of i is', i)

The value of i is 65536

The keyword argument end can be used to avoid the newline after the output, or end the output
with a different string:

>>>
>>> a, b = 0, 1

>>> while a < 1000:

... print(a, end=',')

... a, b = b, a+b

...

0,1,1,2,3,5,8,13,21,34,55,89,144,233,377,610,987,

Footnotes

[1]

Since ** has higher precedence than -, -3**2 will be interpreted as -(3**2) and thus result in -9. To
avoid this and get 9, you can use (-3)**2.

[2]

Unlike other languages, special characters such as \n have the same meaning with both single ('...')
and double ("...") quotes. The only difference between the two is that within single quotes you don’t
need to escape " (but you have to escape \') and vice versa.

3.1.3. Lists

Python knows a number of compound data types, used to group together other values. The most
versatile is the list, which can be written as a list of comma-separated values (items) between square
brackets. Lists might contain items of different types, but usually the items all have the same type.

>>>

>>> squares = [1, 4, 9, 16, 25]

>>> squares

[1, 4, 9, 16, 25]

Like strings (and all other built-in sequence types), lists can be indexed and sliced:

>>>

>>> squares[0] # indexing returns the item

>>> squares[-1]

25

>>> squares[-3:] # slicing returns a new list

[9, 16, 25]

Lists also support operations like concatenation:

>>>
>>> squares + [36, 49, 64, 81, 100]

[1, 4, 9, 16, 25, 36, 49, 64, 81, 100]

Unlike strings, which are immutable, lists are a mutable type, i.e. it is possible to change their
content:

>>>

>>> cubes = [1, 8, 27, 65, 125] # something's wrong here

>>> 4 ** 3 # the cube of 4 is 64, not 65!

64

>>> cubes[3] = 64 # replace the wrong value

>>> cubes

[1, 8, 27, 64, 125]

You can also add new items at the end of the list, by using the list.append() method (we will see
more about methods later):

>>>

>>> cubes.append(216) # add the cube of 6

>>> cubes.append(7 ** 3) # and the cube of 7

>>> cubes

[1, 8, 27, 64, 125, 216, 343]

Simple assignment in Python never copies data. When you assign a list to a variable, the variable
refers to the existing list. Any changes you make to the list through one variable will be seen through
all other variables that refer to it.:

>>>

>>> rgb = ["Red", "Green", "Blue"]

>>> rgba = rgb

>>> id(rgb) == id(rgba) # they reference the same object

True

>>> rgba.append("Alph")

>>> rgb

["Red", "Green", "Blue", "Alph"]

All slice operations return a new list containing the requested elements. This means that the
following slice returns a shallow copy of the list:

>>>

>>> correct_rgba = rgba[:]

>>> correct_rgba[-1] = "Alpha"

>>> correct_rgba

["Red", "Green", "Blue", "Alpha"]

>>> rgba

["Red", "Green", "Blue", "Alph"]

Assignment to slices is also possible, and this can even change the size of the list or clear it entirely:

>>>

>>> letters = ['a', 'b', 'c', 'd', 'e', 'f', 'g']

>>> letters

['a', 'b', 'c', 'd', 'e', 'f', 'g']

>>> # replace some values

>>> letters[2:5] = ['C', 'D', 'E']

>>> letters

['a', 'b', 'C', 'D', 'E', 'f', 'g']

>>> # now remove them

>>> letters[2:5] = []

>>> letters

['a', 'b', 'f', 'g']

>>> # clear the list by replacing all the elements with an empty list

>>> letters[:] = []

>>> letters

[]

The built-in function len() also applies to lists:

>>>

>>> letters = ['a', 'b', 'c', 'd']

>>> len(letters)

It is possible to nest lists (create lists containing other lists), for example:

>>>

>>> a = ['a', 'b', 'c']

>>> n = [1, 2, 3]
>>> x = [a, n]

>>> x

[['a', 'b', 'c'], [1, 2, 3]]

>>> x[0]

['a', 'b', 'c']

>>> x[0][1]

'b'

3.2. First Steps Towards Programming

Of course, we can use Python for more complicated tasks than adding two and two together. For
instance, we can write an initial sub-sequence of the Fibonacci series as follows:

>>>

>>> # Fibonacci series:

>>> # the sum of two elements defines the next

>>> a, b = 0, 1

>>> while a < 10:

... print(a)

... a, b = b, a+b

...

This example introduces several new features.

 The first line contains a multiple assignment: the variables a and b simultaneously get the
new values 0 and 1. On the last line this is used again, demonstrating that the expressions on
the right-hand side are all evaluated first before any of the assignments take place. The right-
hand side expressions are evaluated from the left to the right.

 The while loop executes as long as the condition (here: a < 10) remains true. In Python, like
in C, any non-zero integer value is true; zero is false. The condition may also be a string or list
value, in fact any sequence; anything with a non-zero length is true, empty sequences are
 false. The test used in the example is a simple comparison. The standard comparison
operators are written the same as in C: < (less than), > (greater than), == (equal to), <= (less
than or equal to), >= (greater than or equal to) and != (not equal to).

 The body of the loop is indented: indentation is Python’s way of grouping statements. At the
interactive prompt, you have to type a tab or space(s) for each indented line. In practice you
will prepare more complicated input for Python with a text editor; all decent text editors
have an auto-indent facility. When a compound statement is entered interactively, it must be
followed by a blank line to indicate completion (since the parser cannot guess when you
have typed the last line). Note that each line within a basic block must be indented by the
same amount.

 The print() function writes the value of the argument(s) it is given. It differs from just writing
the expression you want to write (as we did earlier in the calculator examples) in the way it
handles multiple arguments, floating-point quantities, and strings. Strings are printed
without quotes, and a space is inserted between items, so you can format things nicely, like
this:

>>>

>>> i = 256*256

>>> print('The value of i is', i)

The value of i is 65536

The keyword argument end can be used to avoid the newline after the output, or end the output
with a different string:

>>>

>>> a, b = 0, 1

>>> while a < 1000:

... print(a, end=',')

... a, b = b, a+b

...

0,1,1,2,3,5,8,13,21,34,55,89,144,233,377,610,987,

Footnotes

[1]

Since ** has higher precedence than -, -3**2 will be interpreted as -(3**2) and thus result in -9. To
avoid this and get 9, you can use (-3)**2.

[2]

Unlike other languages, special characters such as \n have the same meaning with both single ('...')
and double ("...") quotes. The only difference between the two is that within single quotes you don’t
need to escape " (but you have to escape \') and vice versa.
4. More Control Flow Tools

As well as the while statement just introduced, Python uses a few more that we will encounter in this
chapter.

4.1. if Statements

Perhaps the most well-known statement type is the if statement. For example:

>>>

>>> x = int(input("Please enter an integer: "))

Please enter an integer: 42

>>> if x < 0:

... x=0

... print('Negative changed to zero')

... elif x == 0:

... print('Zero')

... elif x == 1:

... print('Single')

... else:

... print('More')

...

More

There can be zero or more elif parts, and the else part is optional. The keyword ‘elif’ is short for ‘else
if’, and is useful to avoid excessive indentation. An if … elif … elif … sequence is a substitute for
the switch or case statements found in other languages.

If you’re comparing the same value to several constants, or checking for specific types or attributes,
you may also find the match statement useful. For more details see match Statements.

4.2. for Statements

The for statement in Python differs a bit from what you may be used to in C or Pascal. Rather than
always iterating over an arithmetic progression of numbers (like in Pascal), or giving the user the
ability to define both the iteration step and halting condition (as C), Python’s for statement iterates
over the items of any sequence (a list or a string), in the order that they appear in the sequence. For
example (no pun intended):

>>>

>>> # Measure some strings:

>>> words = ['cat', 'window', 'defenestrate']

>>> for w in words:

... print(w, len(w))

...

cat 3

window 6

defenestrate 12

Code that modifies a collection while iterating over that same collection can be tricky to get right.
Instead, it is usually more straight-forward to loop over a copy of the collection or to create a new
collection:

# Create a sample collection

users = {'Hans': 'active', 'Éléonore': 'inactive', '景太郎': 'active'}

# Strategy: Iterate over a copy

for user, status in users.copy().items():

if status == 'inactive':

del users[user]

# Strategy: Create a new collection

active_users = {}

for user, status in users.items():

if status == 'active':

active_users[user] = status

4.3. The range() Function

If you do need to iterate over a sequence of numbers, the built-in function range() comes in handy. It
generates arithmetic progressions:

>>>

>>> for i in range(5):

... print(i)

...

3
4

The given end point is never part of the generated sequence; range(10) generates 10 values, the
legal indices for items of a sequence of length 10. It is possible to let the range start at another
number, or to specify a different increment (even negative; sometimes this is called the ‘step’):

>>>

>>> list(range(5, 10))

[5, 6, 7, 8, 9]

>>> list(range(0, 10, 3))

[0, 3, 6, 9]

>>> list(range(-10, -100, -30))

[-10, -40, -70]

To iterate over the indices of a sequence, you can combine range() and len() as follows:

>>>

>>> a = ['Mary', 'had', 'a', 'little', 'lamb']

>>> for i in range(len(a)):

... print(i, a[i])

...

0 Mary

1 had

2a

3 little

4 lamb

In most such cases, however, it is convenient to use the enumerate() function, see Looping
Techniques.

A strange thing happens if you just print a range:

>>>

>>> range(10)

range(0, 10)

In many ways the object returned by range() behaves as if it is a list, but in fact it isn’t. It is an object
which returns the successive items of the desired sequence when you iterate over it, but it doesn’t
really make the list, thus saving space.
We say such an object is iterable, that is, suitable as a target for functions and constructs that expect
something from which they can obtain successive items until the supply is exhausted. We have seen
that the for statement is such a construct, while an example of a function that takes an iterable
is sum():

>>>

>>> sum(range(4)) # 0 + 1 + 2 + 3

Later we will see more functions that return iterables and take iterables as arguments. In
chapter Data Structures, we will discuss in more detail about list().

4.4. break and continue Statements

The break statement breaks out of the innermost enclosing for or while loop:

>>>

>>> for n in range(2, 10):

... for x in range(2, n):

... if n % x == 0:

... print(f"{n} equals {x} * {n//x}")

... break

...

4 equals 2 * 2

6 equals 2 * 3

8 equals 2 * 4

9 equals 3 * 3

The continue statement continues with the next iteration of the loop:

>>>

>>> for num in range(2, 10):

... if num % 2 == 0:

... print(f"Found an even number {num}")

... continue

... print(f"Found an odd number {num}")

...

Found an even number 2

Found an odd number 3

Found an even number 4

Found an odd number 5

Found an even number 6

Found an odd number 7

Found an even number 8

Found an odd number 9

4.5. else Clauses on Loops

In a for or while loop the break statement may be paired with an else clause. If the loop finishes
without executing the break, the else clause executes.

In a for loop, the else clause is executed after the loop finishes its final iteration, that is, if no break
occurred.

In a while loop, it’s executed after the loop’s condition becomes false.

In either kind of loop, the else clause is not executed if the loop was terminated by a break. Of
course, other ways of ending the loop early, such as a return or a raised exception, will also skip
execution of the else clause.

This is exemplified in the following for loop, which searches for prime numbers:

>>>

>>> for n in range(2, 10):

... for x in range(2, n):

... if n % x == 0:

... print(n, 'equals', x, '*', n//x)

... break

... else:

... # loop fell through without finding a factor

... print(n, 'is a prime number')

...

2 is a prime number

3 is a prime number

4 equals 2 * 2

5 is a prime number

6 equals 2 * 3

7 is a prime number
8 equals 2 * 4

9 equals 3 * 3

(Yes, this is the correct code. Look closely: the else clause belongs to
the for loop, not the if statement.)

One way to think of the else clause is to imagine it paired with the if inside the loop. As the loop
executes, it will run a sequence like if/if/if/else. The if is inside the loop, encountered a number of
times. If the condition is ever true, a break will happen. If the condition is never true, the else clause
outside the loop will execute.

When used with a loop, the else clause has more in common with the else clause of a try statement
than it does with that of if statements: a try statement’s else clause runs when no exception occurs,
and a loop’s else clause runs when no break occurs. For more on the try statement and exceptions,
see Handling Exceptions.

4.6. pass Statements

The pass statement does nothing. It can be used when a statement is required syntactically but the
program requires no action. For example:

>>>

>>> while True:

... pass # Busy-wait for keyboard interrupt (Ctrl+C)

...

This is commonly used for creating minimal classes:

>>>

>>> class MyEmptyClass:

... pass

...

Another place pass can be used is as a place-holder for a function or conditional body when you are
working on new code, allowing you to keep thinking at a more abstract level. The pass is silently
ignored:

>>>

>>> def initlog(*args):

... pass # Remember to implement this!

...

4.7. match Statements

A match statement takes an expression and compares its value to successive patterns given as one or
more case blocks. This is superficially similar to a switch statement in C, Java or JavaScript (and many
other languages), but it’s more similar to pattern matching in languages like Rust or Haskell. Only the
first pattern that matches gets executed and it can also extract components (sequence elements or
object attributes) from the value into variables.

The simplest form compares a subject value against one or more literals:

def http_error(status):

match status:

case 400:

return "Bad request"

case 404:

return "Not found"

case 418:

return "I'm a teapot"

case _:

return "Something's wrong with the internet"

Note the last block: the “variable name” _ acts as a wildcard and never fails to match. If no case
matches, none of the branches is executed.

You can combine several literals in a single pattern using | (“or”):

case 401 | 403 | 404:

return "Not allowed"

Patterns can look like unpacking assignments, and can be used to bind variables:

# point is an (x, y) tuple

match point:

case (0, 0):

print("Origin")

case (0, y):

print(f"Y={y}")

case (x, 0):

print(f"X={x}")

case (x, y):

print(f"X={x}, Y={y}")

case _:

raise ValueError("Not a point")

Study that one carefully! The first pattern has two literals, and can be thought of as an extension of
the literal pattern shown above. But the next two patterns combine a literal and a variable, and the
variable binds a value from the subject (point). The fourth pattern captures two values, which makes
it conceptually similar to the unpacking assignment (x, y) = point.

If you are using classes to structure your data you can use the class name followed by an argument
list resembling a constructor, but with the ability to capture attributes into variables:

class Point:

def __init__(self, x, y):

self.x = x

self.y = y

def where_is(point):

match point:

case Point(x=0, y=0):

print("Origin")

case Point(x=0, y=y):

print(f"Y={y}")

case Point(x=x, y=0):

print(f"X={x}")

case Point():

print("Somewhere else")

case _:

print("Not a point")

You can use positional parameters with some builtin classes that provide an ordering for their
attributes (e.g. dataclasses). You can also define a specific position for attributes in patterns by
setting the __match_args__ special attribute in your classes. If it’s set to (“x”, “y”), the following
patterns are all equivalent (and all bind the y attribute to the var variable):

Point(1, var)

Point(1, y=var)

Point(x=1, y=var)

Point(y=var, x=1)

A recommended way to read patterns is to look at them as an extended form of what you would put
on the left of an assignment, to understand which variables would be set to what. Only the
standalone names (like var above) are assigned to by a match statement. Dotted names (like foo.bar),
attribute names (the x= and y= above) or class names (recognized by the “(…)” next to them
like Point above) are never assigned to.

Patterns can be arbitrarily nested. For example, if we have a short list of Points,
with __match_args__ added, we could match it like this:

class Point:

__match_args__ = ('x', 'y')

def __init__(self, x, y):

self.x = x

self.y = y

match points:

case []:

print("No points")

case [Point(0, 0)]:

print("The origin")

case [Point(x, y)]:

print(f"Single point {x}, {y}")

case [Point(0, y1), Point(0, y2)]:

print(f"Two on the Y axis at {y1}, {y2}")

case _:

print("Something else")

We can add an if clause to a pattern, known as a “guard”. If the guard is false, match goes on to try
the next case block. Note that value capture happens before the guard is evaluated:

match point:

case Point(x, y) if x == y:

print(f"Y=X at {x}")

case Point(x, y):

print(f"Not on the diagonal")

Several other key features of this statement:

 Like unpacking assignments, tuple and list patterns have exactly the same meaning and
actually match arbitrary sequences. An important exception is that they don’t match
iterators or strings.
  Sequence patterns support extended unpacking: [x, y, *rest] and (x, y, *rest) work similar to
unpacking assignments. The name after * may also be _, so (x, y, *_) matches a sequence of
at least two items without binding the remaining items.

 Mapping patterns: {"bandwidth": b, "latency": l} captures

the "bandwidth" and "latency" values from a dictionary. Unlike sequence patterns, extra keys
are ignored. An unpacking like **rest is also supported. (But **_ would be redundant, so it is
not allowed.)

 Subpatterns may be captured using the as keyword:

 case (Point(x1, y1), Point(x2, y2) as p2): ...

will capture the second element of the input as p2 (as long as the input is a sequence of two points)

 Most literals are compared by equality, however the singletons True, False and None are
compared by identity.

 Patterns may use named constants. These must be dotted names to prevent them from
being interpreted as capture variable:

 from enum import Enum

 class Color(Enum):

 RED = 'red'

 GREEN = 'green'

 BLUE = 'blue'

 color = Color(input("Enter your choice of 'red', 'blue' or 'green': "))

 match color:

 case Color.RED:

 print("I see red!")

 case Color.GREEN:

 print("Grass is green")

 case Color.BLUE:

 print("I'm feeling the blues :(")

For a more detailed explanation and additional examples, you can look into PEP 636 which is written
in a tutorial format.

4.8. Defining Functions

We can create a function that writes the Fibonacci series to an arbitrary boundary:

>>>
>>> def fib(n): # write Fibonacci series less than n

... """Print a Fibonacci series less than n."""

... a, b = 0, 1

... while a < n:

... print(a, end=' ')

... a, b = b, a+b

... print()

...

>>> # Now call the function we just defined:

>>> fib(2000)

0 1 1 2 3 5 8 13 21 34 55 89 144 233 377 610 987 1597

The keyword def introduces a function definition. It must be followed by the function name and the
parenthesized list of formal parameters. The statements that form the body of the function start at
the next line, and must be indented.

The first statement of the function body can optionally be a string literal; this string literal is the
function’s documentation string, or docstring. (More about docstrings can be found in the
section Documentation Strings.) There are tools which use docstrings to automatically produce
online or printed documentation, or to let the user interactively browse through code; it’s good
practice to include docstrings in code that you write, so make a habit of it.

The execution of a function introduces a new symbol table used for the local variables of the
function. More precisely, all variable assignments in a function store the value in the local symbol
table; whereas variable references first look in the local symbol table, then in the local symbol tables
of enclosing functions, then in the global symbol table, and finally in the table of built-in names.
Thus, global variables and variables of enclosing functions cannot be directly assigned a value within
a function (unless, for global variables, named in a global statement, or, for variables of enclosing
functions, named in a nonlocal statement), although they may be referenced.

The actual parameters (arguments) to a function call are introduced in the local symbol table of the
called function when it is called; thus, arguments are passed using call by value (where the value is
always an object reference, not the value of the object). [1] When a function calls another function,
or calls itself recursively, a new local symbol table is created for that call.

A function definition associates the function name with the function object in the current symbol
table. The interpreter recognizes the object pointed to by that name as a user-defined function.
Other names can also point to that same function object and can also be used to access the function:

>>>

>>> fib

<function fib at 10042ed0>

>>> f = fib
>>> f(100)

0 1 1 2 3 5 8 13 21 34 55 89

Coming from other languages, you might object that fib is not a function but a procedure since it
doesn’t return a value. In fact, even functions without a return statement do return a value, albeit a
rather boring one. This value is called None (it’s a built-in name). Writing the value None is normally
suppressed by the interpreter if it would be the only value written. You can see it if you really want to
using print():

>>>

>>> fib(0)

>>> print(fib(0))

None

It is simple to write a function that returns a list of the numbers of the Fibonacci series, instead of
printing it:

>>>

>>> def fib2(n): # return Fibonacci series up to n

... """Return a list containing the Fibonacci series up to n."""

... result = []

... a, b = 0, 1

... while a < n:

... result.append(a) # see below

... a, b = b, a+b

... return result

...

>>> f100 = fib2(100) # call it

>>> f100 # write the result

[0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34, 55, 89]

This example, as usual, demonstrates some new Python features:

 The return statement returns with a value from a function. return without an expression
argument returns None. Falling off the end of a function also returns None.

 The statement result.append(a) calls a method of the list object result. A method is a
function that ‘belongs’ to an object and is named obj.methodname, where obj is some
object (this may be an expression), and methodname is the name of a method that is
defined by the object’s type. Different types define different methods. Methods of different
types may have the same name without causing ambiguity. (It is possible to define your own
object types and methods, using classes, see Classes) The method append() shown in the
 example is defined for list objects; it adds a new element at the end of the list. In this
example it is equivalent to result = result + [a], but more efficient.

4.9. More on Defining Functions

It is also possible to define functions with a variable number of arguments. There are three forms,
which can be combined.

4.9.1. Default Argument Values

The most useful form is to specify a default value for one or more arguments. This creates a function
that can be called with fewer arguments than it is defined to allow. For example:

def ask_ok(prompt, retries=4, reminder='Please try again!'):

while True:

reply = input(prompt)

if reply in {'y', 'ye', 'yes'}:

return True

if reply in {'n', 'no', 'nop', 'nope'}:

return False

retries = retries - 1

if retries < 0:

raise ValueError('invalid user response')

print(reminder)

This function can be called in several ways:

 giving only the mandatory argument: ask_ok('Do you really want to quit?')

 giving one of the optional arguments: ask_ok('OK to overwrite the file?', 2)

 or even giving all arguments: ask_ok('OK to overwrite the file?', 2, 'Come on, only yes or no!')

This example also introduces the in keyword. This tests whether or not a sequence contains a certain
value.

The default values are evaluated at the point of function definition in the defining scope, so that

i=5

def f(arg=i):

print(arg)

i=6
f()

will print 5.

Important warning: The default value is evaluated only once. This makes a difference when the
default is a mutable object such as a list, dictionary, or instances of most classes. For example, the
following function accumulates the arguments passed to it on subsequent calls:

def f(a, L=[]):

L.append(a)

return L

print(f(1))

print(f(2))

print(f(3))

This will print

[1]

[1, 2]

[1, 2, 3]

If you don’t want the default to be shared between subsequent calls, you can write the function like
this instead:

def f(a, L=None):

if L is None:

L = []

L.append(a)

return L

4.9.2. Keyword Arguments

Functions can also be called using keyword arguments of the form kwarg=value. For instance, the
following function:

def parrot(voltage, state='a stiff', action='voom', type='Norwegian Blue'):

print("-- This parrot wouldn't", action, end=' ')

print("if you put", voltage, "volts through it.")

print("-- Lovely plumage, the", type)

print("-- It's", state, "!")

accepts one required argument (voltage) and three optional arguments (state, action, and type). This
function can be called in any of the following ways:
parrot(1000) # 1 positional argument

parrot(voltage=1000) # 1 keyword argument

parrot(voltage=1000000, action='VOOOOOM') # 2 keyword arguments

parrot(action='VOOOOOM', voltage=1000000) # 2 keyword arguments

parrot('a million', 'bereft of life', 'jump') # 3 positional arguments

parrot('a thousand', state='pushing up the daisies') # 1 positional, 1 keyword

but all the following calls would be invalid:

parrot() # required argument missing

parrot(voltage=5.0, 'dead') # non-keyword argument after a keyword argument

parrot(110, voltage=220) # duplicate value for the same argument

parrot(actor='John Cleese') # unknown keyword argument

In a function call, keyword arguments must follow positional arguments. All the keyword arguments
passed must match one of the arguments accepted by the function (e.g. actor is not a valid argument
for the parrot function), and their order is not important. This also includes non-optional arguments
(e.g. parrot(voltage=1000) is valid too). No argument may receive a value more than once. Here’s an
example that fails due to this restriction:

>>>

>>> def function(a):

... pass

...

>>> function(0, a=0)

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

TypeError: function() got multiple values for argument 'a'

When a final formal parameter of the form **name is present, it receives a dictionary (see Mapping
Types — dict) containing all keyword arguments except for those corresponding to a formal
parameter. This may be combined with a formal parameter of the form *name (described in the next
subsection) which receives a tuple containing the positional arguments beyond the formal parameter
list. (*name must occur before **name.) For example, if we define a function like this:

def cheeseshop(kind, *arguments, **keywords):

print("-- Do you have any", kind, "?")

print("-- I'm sorry, we're all out of", kind)

for arg in arguments:

print(arg)
 print("-" * 40)

for kw in keywords:

print(kw, ":", keywords[kw])

It could be called like this:

cheeseshop("Limburger", "It's very runny, sir.",

"It's really very, VERY runny, sir.",

shopkeeper="Michael Palin",

client="John Cleese",

sketch="Cheese Shop Sketch")

and of course it would print:

-- Do you have any Limburger ?

-- I'm sorry, we're all out of Limburger

It's very runny, sir.

It's really very, VERY runny, sir.

----------------------------------------

shopkeeper : Michael Palin

client : John Cleese

sketch : Cheese Shop Sketch

Note that the order in which the keyword arguments are printed is guaranteed to match the order in
which they were provided in the function call.

4.9.3. Special parameters

By default, arguments may be passed to a Python function either by position or explicitly by

keyword. For readability and performance, it makes sense to restrict the way arguments can be
passed so that a developer need only look at the function definition to determine if items are passed
by position, by position or keyword, or by keyword.

A function definition may look like:

def f(pos1, pos2, /, pos_or_kwd, *, kwd1, kwd2):

----------- ---------- ----------

| | |

| Positional or keyword |

| - Keyword only

-- Positional only
where / and * are optional. If used, these symbols indicate the kind of parameter by how the
arguments may be passed to the function: positional-only, positional-or-keyword, and keyword-only.
Keyword parameters are also referred to as named parameters.

4.9.3.1. Positional-or-Keyword Arguments

If / and * are not present in the function definition, arguments may be passed to a function by
position or by keyword.

4.9.3.2. Positional-Only Parameters

Looking at this in a bit more detail, it is possible to mark certain parameters as positional-only.
If positional-only, the parameters’ order matters, and the parameters cannot be passed by keyword.
Positional-only parameters are placed before a / (forward-slash). The / is used to logically separate
the positional-only parameters from the rest of the parameters. If there is no / in the function
definition, there are no positional-only parameters.

Parameters following the / may be positional-or-keyword or keyword-only.

4.9.3.3. Keyword-Only Arguments

To mark parameters as keyword-only, indicating the parameters must be passed by keyword

argument, place an * in the arguments list just before the first keyword-only parameter.

4.9.3.4. Function Examples

Consider the following example function definitions paying close attention to the markers / and *:

>>>

>>> def standard_arg(arg):

... print(arg)

...

>>> def pos_only_arg(arg, /):

... print(arg)

...

>>> def kwd_only_arg(*, arg):

... print(arg)

...

>>> def combined_example(pos_only, /, standard, *, kwd_only):

... print(pos_only, standard, kwd_only)

The first function definition, standard_arg, the most familiar form, places no restrictions on the
calling convention and arguments may be passed by position or keyword:

>>>

>>> standard_arg(2)
2

>>> standard_arg(arg=2)

The second function pos_only_arg is restricted to only use positional parameters as there is a / in the
function definition:

>>>

>>> pos_only_arg(1)

>>> pos_only_arg(arg=1)

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

TypeError: pos_only_arg() got some positional-only arguments passed as keyword arguments: 'arg'

The third function kwd_only_arg only allows keyword arguments as indicated by a * in the function
definition:

>>>

>>> kwd_only_arg(3)

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

TypeError: kwd_only_arg() takes 0 positional arguments but 1 was given

>>> kwd_only_arg(arg=3)

And the last uses all three calling conventions in the same function definition:

>>>

>>> combined_example(1, 2, 3)

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

TypeError: combined_example() takes 2 positional arguments but 3 were given

>>> combined_example(1, 2, kwd_only=3)

123

>>> combined_example(1, standard=2, kwd_only=3)

123

>>> combined_example(pos_only=1, standard=2, kwd_only=3)

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

TypeError: combined_example() got some positional-only arguments passed as keyword arguments:

'pos_only'

Finally, consider this function definition which has a potential collision between the positional
argument name and **kwds which has name as a key:

def foo(name, **kwds):

return 'name' in kwds

There is no possible call that will make it return True as the keyword 'name' will always bind to the
first parameter. For example:

>>>

>>> foo(1, **{'name': 2})

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

TypeError: foo() got multiple values for argument 'name'

>>>

But using / (positional only arguments), it is possible since it allows name as a positional argument
and 'name' as a key in the keyword arguments:

>>>

>>> def foo(name, /, **kwds):

... return 'name' in kwds

...

>>> foo(1, **{'name': 2})

True

In other words, the names of positional-only parameters can be used in **kwds without ambiguity.

4.9.3.5. Recap
The use case will determine which parameters to use in the function definition:

def f(pos1, pos2, /, pos_or_kwd, *, kwd1, kwd2):

As guidance:

 Use positional-only if you want the name of the parameters to not be available to the user.
This is useful when parameter names have no real meaning, if you want to enforce the order
of the arguments when the function is called or if you need to take some positional
parameters and arbitrary keywords.

 Use keyword-only when names have meaning and the function definition is more
understandable by being explicit with names or you want to prevent users relying on the
position of the argument being passed.

 For an API, use positional-only to prevent breaking API changes if the parameter’s name is
modified in the future.

4.9.4. Arbitrary Argument Lists

Finally, the least frequently used option is to specify that a function can be called with an arbitrary
number of arguments. These arguments will be wrapped up in a tuple (see Tuples and Sequences).
Before the variable number of arguments, zero or more normal arguments may occur.

def write_multiple_items(file, separator, *args):

file.write(separator.join(args))

Normally, these variadic arguments will be last in the list of formal parameters, because they scoop
up all remaining input arguments that are passed to the function. Any formal parameters which
occur after the *args parameter are ‘keyword-only’ arguments, meaning that they can only be used
as keywords rather than positional arguments.

>>>

>>> def concat(*args, sep="/"):

... return sep.join(args)

...

>>> concat("earth", "mars", "venus")

'earth/mars/venus'

>>> concat("earth", "mars", "venus", sep=".")

'earth.mars.venus'

4.9.5. Unpacking Argument Lists

The reverse situation occurs when the arguments are already in a list or tuple but need to be
unpacked for a function call requiring separate positional arguments. For instance, the built-
in range() function expects separate start and stop arguments. If they are not available separately,
write the function call with the *-operator to unpack the arguments out of a list or tuple:

>>>
>>> list(range(3, 6)) # normal call with separate arguments

[3, 4, 5]

>>> args = [3, 6]

>>> list(range(*args)) # call with arguments unpacked from a list

[3, 4, 5]

In the same fashion, dictionaries can deliver keyword arguments with the **-operator:

>>>

>>> def parrot(voltage, state='a stiff', action='voom'):

... print("-- This parrot wouldn't", action, end=' ')

... print("if you put", voltage, "volts through it.", end=' ')

... print("E's", state, "!")

...

>>> d = {"voltage": "four million", "state": "bleedin' demised", "action": "VOOM"}

>>> parrot(**d)

-- This parrot wouldn't VOOM if you put four million volts through it. E's bleedin' demised !

4.9.6. Lambda Expressions

Small anonymous functions can be created with the lambda keyword. This function returns the sum
of its two arguments: lambda a, b: a+b. Lambda functions can be used wherever function objects are
required. They are syntactically restricted to a single expression. Semantically, they are just syntactic
sugar for a normal function definition. Like nested function definitions, lambda functions can
reference variables from the containing scope:

>>>

>>> def make_incrementor(n):

... return lambda x: x + n

...

>>> f = make_incrementor(42)

>>> f(0)

42

>>> f(1)

43

The above example uses a lambda expression to return a function. Another use is to pass a small
function as an argument:

>>>
>>> pairs = [(1, 'one'), (2, 'two'), (3, 'three'), (4, 'four')]

>>> pairs.sort(key=lambda pair: pair[1])

>>> pairs

[(4, 'four'), (1, 'one'), (3, 'three'), (2, 'two')]

4.9.7. Documentation Strings

Here are some conventions about the content and formatting of documentation strings.

The first line should always be a short, concise summary of the object’s purpose. For brevity, it
should not explicitly state the object’s name or type, since these are available by other means
(except if the name happens to be a verb describing a function’s operation). This line should begin
with a capital letter and end with a period.

If there are more lines in the documentation string, the second line should be blank, visually
separating the summary from the rest of the description. The following lines should be one or more
paragraphs describing the object’s calling conventions, its side effects, etc.

The Python parser does not strip indentation from multi-line string literals in Python, so tools that
process documentation have to strip indentation if desired. This is done using the following
convention. The first non-blank line after the first line of the string determines the amount of
indentation for the entire documentation string. (We can’t use the first line since it is generally
adjacent to the string’s opening quotes so its indentation is not apparent in the string literal.)
Whitespace “equivalent” to this indentation is then stripped from the start of all lines of the string.
Lines that are indented less should not occur, but if they occur all their leading whitespace should be
stripped. Equivalence of whitespace should be tested after expansion of tabs (to 8 spaces, normally).

Here is an example of a multi-line docstring:

>>>

>>> def my_function():

... """Do nothing, but document it.

...

... No, really, it doesn't do anything.

... """

... pass

...

>>> print(my_function.__doc__)

Do nothing, but document it.

No, really, it doesn't do anything.

4.9.8. Function Annotations

Function annotations are completely optional metadata information about the types used by user-
defined functions (see PEP 3107 and PEP 484 for more information).

Annotations are stored in the __annotations__ attribute of the function as a dictionary and have no
effect on any other part of the function. Parameter annotations are defined by a colon after the
parameter name, followed by an expression evaluating to the value of the annotation. Return
annotations are defined by a literal ->, followed by an expression, between the parameter list and
the colon denoting the end of the def statement. The following example has a required argument, an
optional argument, and the return value annotated:

>>>

>>> def f(ham: str, eggs: str = 'eggs') -> str:

... print("Annotations:", f.__annotations__)

... print("Arguments:", ham, eggs)

... return ham + ' and ' + eggs

...

>>> f('spam')

Annotations: {'ham': <class 'str'>, 'return': <class 'str'>, 'eggs': <class 'str'>}

Arguments: spam eggs

'spam and eggs'

4.10. Intermezzo: Coding Style

Now that you are about to write longer, more complex pieces of Python, it is a good time to talk
about coding style. Most languages can be written (or more concise, formatted) in different styles;
some are more readable than others. Making it easy for others to read your code is always a good
idea, and adopting a nice coding style helps tremendously for that.

For Python, PEP 8 has emerged as the style guide that most projects adhere to; it promotes a very
readable and eye-pleasing coding style. Every Python developer should read it at some point; here
are the most important points extracted for you:

 Use 4-space indentation, and no tabs.

4 spaces are a good compromise between small indentation (allows greater nesting depth) and large
indentation (easier to read). Tabs introduce confusion, and are best left out.

 Wrap lines so that they don’t exceed 79 characters.

This helps users with small displays and makes it possible to have several code files side-by-side on
larger displays.

 Use blank lines to separate functions and classes, and larger blocks of code inside functions.

 When possible, put comments on a line of their own.

 Use docstrings.
  Use spaces around operators and after commas, but not directly inside bracketing
constructs: a = f(1, 2) + g(3, 4).

 Name your classes and functions consistently; the convention is to use UpperCamelCase for
classes and lowercase_with_underscores for functions and methods. Always use self as the
name for the first method argument (see A First Look at Classes for more on classes and
methods).

 Don’t use fancy encodings if your code is meant to be used in international environments.
Python’s default, UTF-8, or even plain ASCII work best in any case.

 Likewise, don’t use non-ASCII characters in identifiers if there is only the slightest chance
people speaking a different language will read or maintain the code.

Footnotes

[1]

Actually, call by object reference would be a better description, since if a mutable object is passed,
the caller will see any changes the callee makes to it (items inserted into a list).

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. Similar to a[len(a):] = [x].

list.extend(iterable)

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

list.insert(i, x)

Insert an item at a given position. The first argument is the index of the element 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. It raises an IndexError if the list is
empty or the index is outside the list range.
list.clear()

Remove all items from the list. Similar 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.

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 returned 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 customization, see sorted() for
their explanation).

list.reverse()

Reverse the elements of the list in place.

list.copy()

Return a shallow copy of the list. Similar to a[:].

An example that uses most of the list methods:

>>>

>>> fruits = ['orange', 'apple', 'pear', 'banana', 'kiwi', 'apple', 'banana']

>>> fruits.count('apple')

>>> fruits.count('tangerine')

>>> fruits.index('banana')

>>> fruits.index('banana', 4) # Find next banana starting at position 4

>>> 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 modify 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.

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()

>>> stack

[3, 4, 5, 6]

>>> stack.pop()

>>> stack.pop()

>>> 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 efficient for this purpose. 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

>>> 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 effects 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 resulting 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:

>>>

>>> 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

[x, x**2 for x in range(6)]

^^^^^^^

SyntaxError: did you forget parentheses around the comprehension target?

>>> # 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

>>> [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, including 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 inner list comprehension 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]]

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 differs 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 assigned 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:

>>>

>>> 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 tuple, 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 different situations and for different
purposes. Tuples are immutable, and usually contain a heterogeneous sequence of elements that are
accessed via unpacking (see later in this section) or indexing (or even by attribute in the case
of namedtuples). Lists are mutable, 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 value with a comma (it is not sufficient to enclose a
single value in parentheses). Ugly, but effective. For example:

>>>

>>> empty = ()

>>> singleton = 'hello', # <-- note trailing comma

>>> len(empty)

>>> len(singleton)
1

>>> 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 operation is also
possible:

>>>

>>> x, y, z = t

This is called, appropriately enough, sequence unpacking and works for any sequence 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 sequence. Note that multiple assignment is really just a
combination of tuple packing 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 duplicate entries. Set objects also
support mathematical operations like union, intersection, difference, and symmetric difference.

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 removed

{'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

{'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 memories” 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
contain 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 extracting 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 dictionary, 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:

>>>

>>> 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 retrieved at the same
time using the items() method.

>>>

>>> knights = {'gallahad': 'the pure', 'robin': 'the brave'}

>>> for k, v in knights.items():

... 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 direction and then call
the reversed() function.

>>>
>>> for i in reversed(range(1, 10, 2)):

... print(i)

...

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)

...

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 are membership tests that determine whether a value is in
(or not in) a container. 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.

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
express the desired composition.

The Boolean operators and and or are so-called short-circuit operators: their arguments are
evaluated from left to right, and evaluation stops as soon as the outcome 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 explicitly with the walrus
operator :=. This avoids a common class of problems encountered 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 sequence type. The
comparison uses lexicographical ordering: first the first two items are compared, and if they differ
this determines the outcome of the comparison; 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 between 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 different 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. Otherwise, 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 chaining, such as d-
>insert("a")->remove("b")->sort();.

6. Modules

If you quit from the Python interpreter and enter it again, the definitions you have made (functions
and variables) are lost. Therefore, if you want to write a somewhat longer program, you are better off
using a text editor to prepare the input for the interpreter and running it with that file as input
instead. This is known as creating a script. As your program gets longer, you may want to split it into
several files for easier maintenance. You may also want to use a handy function that you’ve written in
several programs without copying its definition into each program.
To support this, Python has a way to put definitions in a file and use them in a script or in an
interactive instance of the interpreter. Such a file is called a module; definitions from a module can
be imported into other modules or into the main module (the collection of variables that you have
access to in a script executed at the top level and in calculator mode).

A module is a file containing Python definitions and statements. The file name is the module name
with the suffix .py appended. Within a module, the module’s name (as a string) is available as the
value of the global variable __name__. For instance, use your favorite text editor to create a file
called fibo.py in the current directory with the following contents:

# Fibonacci numbers module

def fib(n): # write Fibonacci series up to n

a, b = 0, 1

while a < n:

print(a, end=' ')

a, b = b, a+b

print()

def fib2(n): # return Fibonacci series up to n

result = []

a, b = 0, 1

while a < n:

result.append(a)

a, b = b, a+b

return result

Now enter the Python interpreter and import this module with the following command:

>>>

>>> import fibo

This does not add the names of the functions defined in fibo directly to the
current namespace (see Python Scopes and Namespaces for more details); it only adds the module
name fibo there. Using the module name you can access the functions:

>>>

>>> fibo.fib(1000)

0 1 1 2 3 5 8 13 21 34 55 89 144 233 377 610 987

>>> fibo.fib2(100)
[0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34, 55, 89]

>>> fibo.__name__

'fibo'

If you intend to use a function often you can assign it to a local name:

>>>

>>> fib = fibo.fib

>>> fib(500)

0 1 1 2 3 5 8 13 21 34 55 89 144 233 377

6.1. More on Modules

A module can contain executable statements as well as function definitions. These statements are
intended to initialize the module. They are executed only the first time the module name is
encountered in an import statement. [1] (They are also run if the file is executed as a script.)

Each module has its own private namespace, which is used as the global namespace by all functions
defined in the module. Thus, the author of a module can use global variables in the module without
worrying about accidental clashes with a user’s global variables. On the other hand, if you know
what you are doing you can touch a module’s global variables with the same notation used to refer
to its functions, modname.itemname.

Modules can import other modules. It is customary but not required to place all import statements
at the beginning of a module (or script, for that matter). The imported module names, if placed at
the top level of a module (outside any functions or classes), are added to the module’s global
namespace.

There is a variant of the import statement that imports names from a module directly into the
importing module’s namespace. For example:

>>>

>>> from fibo import fib, fib2

>>> fib(500)

0 1 1 2 3 5 8 13 21 34 55 89 144 233 377

This does not introduce the module name from which the imports are taken in the local namespace
(so in the example, fibo is not defined).

There is even a variant to import all names that a module defines:

>>>

>>> from fibo import *

>>> fib(500)

0 1 1 2 3 5 8 13 21 34 55 89 144 233 377

This imports all names except those beginning with an underscore (_). In most cases Python
programmers do not use this facility since it introduces an unknown set of names into the
interpreter, possibly hiding some things you have already defined.

Note that in general the practice of importing * from a module or package is frowned upon, since it
often causes poorly readable code. However, it is okay to use it to save typing in interactive sessions.

If the module name is followed by as, then the name following as is bound directly to the imported
module.

>>>

>>> import fibo as fib

>>> fib.fib(500)

0 1 1 2 3 5 8 13 21 34 55 89 144 233 377

This is effectively importing the module in the same way that import fibo will do, with the only
difference of it being available as fib.

It can also be used when utilising from with similar effects:

>>>

>>> from fibo import fib as fibonacci

>>> fibonacci(500)

0 1 1 2 3 5 8 13 21 34 55 89 144 233 377

Note

For efficiency reasons, each module is only imported once per interpreter session. Therefore, if you
change your modules, you must restart the interpreter – or, if it’s just one module you want to test
interactively, use importlib.reload(), e.g. import importlib; importlib.reload(modulename).

6.1.1. Executing modules as scripts

When you run a Python module with

python fibo.py <arguments>

the code in the module will be executed, just as if you imported it, but with the __name__ set
to "__main__". That means that by adding this code at the end of your module:

if __name__ == "__main__":

import sys

fib(int(sys.argv[1]))

you can make the file usable as a script as well as an importable module, because the code that
parses the command line only runs if the module is executed as the “main” file:

$ python fibo.py 50
0 1 1 2 3 5 8 13 21 34

If the module is imported, the code is not run:

>>>

>>> import fibo

>>>

This is often used either to provide a convenient user interface to a module, or for testing purposes
(running the module as a script executes a test suite).

6.1.2. The Module Search Path

When a module named spam is imported, the interpreter first searches for a built-in module with
that name. These module names are listed in sys.builtin_module_names. If not found, it then
searches for a file named spam.py in a list of directories given by the variable sys.path. sys.path is
initialized from these locations:

 The directory containing the input script (or the current directory when no file is specified).

 PYTHONPATH (a list of directory names, with the same syntax as the shell variable PATH).

 The installation-dependent default (by convention including a site-packages directory,

handled by the site module).

More details are at The initialization of the sys.path module search path.

Note

On file systems which support symlinks, the directory containing the input script is calculated after
the symlink is followed. In other words the directory containing the symlink is not added to the
module search path.

After initialization, Python programs can modify sys.path. The directory containing the script being
run is placed at the beginning of the search path, ahead of the standard library path. This means that
scripts in that directory will be loaded instead of modules of the same name in the library directory.
This is an error unless the replacement is intended. See section Standard Modules for more
information.

6.1.3. “Compiled” Python files

To speed up loading modules, Python caches the compiled version of each module in
the __pycache__ directory under the name module.version.pyc, where the version encodes the
format of the compiled file; it generally contains the Python version number. For example, in
CPython release 3.3 the compiled version of spam.py would be cached
as __pycache__/spam.cpython-33.pyc. This naming convention allows compiled modules from
different releases and different versions of Python to coexist.

Python checks the modification date of the source against the compiled version to see if it’s out of
date and needs to be recompiled. This is a completely automatic process. Also, the compiled
modules are platform-independent, so the same library can be shared among systems with different
architectures.
Python does not check the cache in two circumstances. First, it always recompiles and does not store
the result for the module that’s loaded directly from the command line. Second, it does not check
the cache if there is no source module. To support a non-source (compiled only) distribution, the
compiled module must be in the source directory, and there must not be a source module.

Some tips for experts:

 You can use the -O or -OO switches on the Python command to reduce the size of a compiled
module. The -O switch removes assert statements, the -OO switch removes both assert
statements and __doc__ strings. Since some programs may rely on having these available,
you should only use this option if you know what you’re doing. “Optimized” modules have
an opt- tag and are usually smaller. Future releases may change the effects of optimization.

 A program doesn’t run any faster when it is read from a .pyc file than when it is read from
a .py file; the only thing that’s faster about .pyc files is the speed with which they are loaded.

 The module compileall can create .pyc files for all modules in a directory.

 There is more detail on this process, including a flow chart of the decisions, in PEP 3147.

6.2. Standard Modules

Python comes with a library of standard modules, described in a separate document, the Python
Library Reference (“Library Reference” hereafter). Some modules are built into the interpreter; these
provide access to operations that are not part of the core of the language but are nevertheless built
in, either for efficiency or to provide access to operating system primitives such as system calls. The
set of such modules is a configuration option which also depends on the underlying platform. For
example, the winreg module is only provided on Windows systems. One particular module deserves
some attention: sys, which is built into every Python interpreter. The
variables sys.ps1 and sys.ps2 define the strings used as primary and secondary prompts:

>>>

>>> import sys

>>> sys.ps1

'>>> '

>>> sys.ps2

'... '

>>> sys.ps1 = 'C> '

C> print('Yuck!')

Yuck!

C>

These two variables are only defined if the interpreter is in interactive mode.

The variable sys.path is a list of strings that determines the interpreter’s search path for modules. It is
initialized to a default path taken from the environment variable PYTHONPATH, or from a built-in
default if PYTHONPATH is not set. You can modify it using standard list operations:
>>>

>>> import sys

>>> sys.path.append('/ufs/guido/lib/python')

6.3. The dir() Function

The built-in function dir() is used to find out which names a module defines. It returns a sorted list of
strings:

>>>

>>> import fibo, sys

>>> dir(fibo)

['__name__', 'fib', 'fib2']

>>> dir(sys)

['__breakpointhook__', '__displayhook__', '__doc__', '__excepthook__',

'__interactivehook__', '__loader__', '__name__', '__package__', '__spec__',

'__stderr__', '__stdin__', '__stdout__', '__unraisablehook__',

'_clear_type_cache', '_current_frames', '_debugmallocstats', '_framework',

'_getframe', '_git', '_home', '_xoptions', 'abiflags', 'addaudithook',

'api_version', 'argv', 'audit', 'base_exec_prefix', 'base_prefix',

'breakpointhook', 'builtin_module_names', 'byteorder', 'call_tracing',

'callstats', 'copyright', 'displayhook', 'dont_write_bytecode', 'exc_info',

'excepthook', 'exec_prefix', 'executable', 'exit', 'flags', 'float_info',

'float_repr_style', 'get_asyncgen_hooks', 'get_coroutine_origin_tracking_depth',

'getallocatedblocks', 'getdefaultencoding', 'getdlopenflags',

'getfilesystemencodeerrors', 'getfilesystemencoding', 'getprofile',

'getrecursionlimit', 'getrefcount', 'getsizeof', 'getswitchinterval',

'gettrace', 'hash_info', 'hexversion', 'implementation', 'int_info',

'intern', 'is_finalizing', 'last_traceback', 'last_type', 'last_value',

'maxsize', 'maxunicode', 'meta_path', 'modules', 'path', 'path_hooks',

'path_importer_cache', 'platform', 'prefix', 'ps1', 'ps2', 'pycache_prefix',

'set_asyncgen_hooks', 'set_coroutine_origin_tracking_depth', 'setdlopenflags',

'setprofile', 'setrecursionlimit', 'setswitchinterval', 'settrace', 'stderr',

'stdin', 'stdout', 'thread_info', 'unraisablehook', 'version', 'version_info',

'warnoptions']

Without arguments, dir() lists the names you have defined currently:

>>>

>>> a = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]

>>> import fibo

>>> fib = fibo.fib

>>> dir()

['__builtins__', '__name__', 'a', 'fib', 'fibo', 'sys']

Note that it lists all types of names: variables, modules, functions, etc.

dir() does not list the names of built-in functions and variables. If you want a list of those, they are
defined in the standard module builtins:

>>>

>>> import builtins

>>> dir(builtins)

['ArithmeticError', 'AssertionError', 'AttributeError', 'BaseException',

'BlockingIOError', 'BrokenPipeError', 'BufferError', 'BytesWarning',

'ChildProcessError', 'ConnectionAbortedError', 'ConnectionError',

'ConnectionRefusedError', 'ConnectionResetError', 'DeprecationWarning',

'EOFError', 'Ellipsis', 'EnvironmentError', 'Exception', 'False',

'FileExistsError', 'FileNotFoundError', 'FloatingPointError',

'FutureWarning', 'GeneratorExit', 'IOError', 'ImportError',

'ImportWarning', 'IndentationError', 'IndexError', 'InterruptedError',

'IsADirectoryError', 'KeyError', 'KeyboardInterrupt', 'LookupError',

'MemoryError', 'NameError', 'None', 'NotADirectoryError', 'NotImplemented',

'NotImplementedError', 'OSError', 'OverflowError',

'PendingDeprecationWarning', 'PermissionError', 'ProcessLookupError',

'ReferenceError', 'ResourceWarning', 'RuntimeError', 'RuntimeWarning',

'StopIteration', 'SyntaxError', 'SyntaxWarning', 'SystemError',

'SystemExit', 'TabError', 'TimeoutError', 'True', 'TypeError',

'UnboundLocalError', 'UnicodeDecodeError', 'UnicodeEncodeError',

'UnicodeError', 'UnicodeTranslateError', 'UnicodeWarning', 'UserWarning',

'ValueError', 'Warning', 'ZeroDivisionError', '_', '__build_class__',

'__debug__', '__doc__', '__import__', '__name__', '__package__', 'abs',

'all', 'any', 'ascii', 'bin', 'bool', 'bytearray', 'bytes', 'callable',

'chr', 'classmethod', 'compile', 'complex', 'copyright', 'credits',

'delattr', 'dict', 'dir', 'divmod', 'enumerate', 'eval', 'exec', 'exit',

'filter', 'float', 'format', 'frozenset', 'getattr', 'globals', 'hasattr',

'hash', 'help', 'hex', 'id', 'input', 'int', 'isinstance', 'issubclass',

'iter', 'len', 'license', 'list', 'locals', 'map', 'max', 'memoryview',

'min', 'next', 'object', 'oct', 'open', 'ord', 'pow', 'print', 'property',

'quit', 'range', 'repr', 'reversed', 'round', 'set', 'setattr', 'slice',

'sorted', 'staticmethod', 'str', 'sum', 'super', 'tuple', 'type', 'vars',

'zip']

6.4. Packages

Packages are a way of structuring Python’s module namespace by using “dotted module names”. For
example, the module name A.B designates a submodule named B in a package named A. Just like the
use of modules saves the authors of different modules from having to worry about each other’s
global variable names, the use of dotted module names saves the authors of multi-module packages
like NumPy or Pillow from having to worry about each other’s module names.

Suppose you want to design a collection of modules (a “package”) for the uniform handling of sound
files and sound data. There are many different sound file formats (usually recognized by their
extension, for example: .wav, .aiff, .au), so you may need to create and maintain a growing collection
of modules for the conversion between the various file formats. There are also many different
operations you might want to perform on sound data (such as mixing, adding echo, applying an
equalizer function, creating an artificial stereo effect), so in addition you will be writing a never-
ending stream of modules to perform these operations. Here’s a possible structure for your package
(expressed in terms of a hierarchical filesystem):

sound/ Top-level package

__init__.py Initialize the sound package

formats/ Subpackage for file format conversions

__init__.py

wavread.py

wavwrite.py

aiffread.py

aiffwrite.py

auread.py
 auwrite.py

...

effects/ Subpackage for sound effects

__init__.py

echo.py

surround.py

reverse.py

...

filters/ Subpackage for filters

__init__.py

equalizer.py

vocoder.py

karaoke.py

...

When importing the package, Python searches through the directories on sys.path looking for the
package subdirectory.

The __init__.py files are required to make Python treat directories containing the file as packages
(unless using a namespace package, a relatively advanced feature). This prevents directories with a
common name, such as string, from unintentionally hiding valid modules that occur later on the
module search path. In the simplest case, __init__.py can just be an empty file, but it can also
execute initialization code for the package or set the __all__ variable, described later.

Users of the package can import individual modules from the package, for example:

import sound.effects.echo

This loads the submodule sound.effects.echo. It must be referenced with its full name.

sound.effects.echo.echofilter(input, output, delay=0.7, atten=4)

An alternative way of importing the submodule is:

from sound.effects import echo

This also loads the submodule echo, and makes it available without its package prefix, so it can be
used as follows:

echo.echofilter(input, output, delay=0.7, atten=4)

Yet another variation is to import the desired function or variable directly:

from sound.effects.echo import echofilter

Again, this loads the submodule echo, but this makes its function echofilter() directly available:
echofilter(input, output, delay=0.7, atten=4)

Note that when using from package import item, the item can be either a submodule (or
subpackage) of the package, or some other name defined in the package, like a function, class or
variable. The import statement first tests whether the item is defined in the package; if not, it
assumes it is a module and attempts to load it. If it fails to find it, an ImportError exception is raised.

Contrarily, when using syntax like import item.subitem.subsubitem, each item except for the last
must be a package; the last item can be a module or a package but can’t be a class or function or
variable defined in the previous item.

6.4.1. Importing * From a Package

Now what happens when the user writes from sound.effects import *? Ideally, one would hope that
this somehow goes out to the filesystem, finds which submodules are present in the package, and
imports them all. This could take a long time and importing sub-modules might have unwanted side-
effects that should only happen when the sub-module is explicitly imported.

The only solution is for the package author to provide an explicit index of the package.
The import statement uses the following convention: if a package’s __init__.py code defines a list
named __all__, it is taken to be the list of module names that should be imported
when from package import * is encountered. It is up to the package author to keep this list up-to-
date when a new version of the package is released. Package authors may also decide not to support
it, if they don’t see a use for importing * from their package. For example, the
file sound/effects/__init__.py could contain the following code:

__all__ = ["echo", "surround", "reverse"]

This would mean that from sound.effects import * would import the three named submodules of
the sound.effects package.

Be aware that submodules might become shadowed by locally defined names. For example, if you
added a reverse function to the sound/effects/__init__.py file,
the from sound.effects import * would only import the two submodules echo and surround,
but not the reverse submodule, because it is shadowed by the locally defined reverse function:

__all__ = [

"echo", # refers to the 'echo.py' file

"surround", # refers to the 'surround.py' file

"reverse", # !!! refers to the 'reverse' function now !!!

def reverse(msg: str): # <-- this name shadows the 'reverse.py' submodule

return msg[::-1] # in the case of a 'from sound.effects import *'

If __all__ is not defined, the statement from sound.effects import * does not import all submodules
from the package sound.effects into the current namespace; it only ensures that the
package sound.effects has been imported (possibly running any initialization code in __init__.py) and
then imports whatever names are defined in the package. This includes any names defined (and
submodules explicitly loaded) by __init__.py. It also includes any submodules of the package that
were explicitly loaded by previous import statements. Consider this code:

import sound.effects.echo

import sound.effects.surround

from sound.effects import *

In this example, the echo and surround modules are imported in the current namespace because
they are defined in the sound.effects package when the from...import statement is executed. (This
also works when __all__ is defined.)

Although certain modules are designed to export only names that follow certain patterns when you
use import *, it is still considered bad practice in production code.

Remember, there is nothing wrong with using from package import specific_submodule! In fact, this
is the recommended notation unless the importing module needs to use submodules with the same
name from different packages.

6.4.2. Intra-package References

When packages are structured into subpackages (as with the sound package in the example), you can
use absolute imports to refer to submodules of siblings packages. For example, if the
module sound.filters.vocoder needs to use the echo module in the sound.effects package, it can
use from sound.effects import echo.

You can also write relative imports, with the from module import name form of import statement.
These imports use leading dots to indicate the current and parent packages involved in the relative
import. From the surround module for example, you might use:

from . import echo

from .. import formats

from ..filters import equalizer

Note that relative imports are based on the name of the current module. Since the name of the main
module is always "__main__", modules intended for use as the main module of a Python application
must always use absolute imports.

6.4.3. Packages in Multiple Directories

Packages support one more special attribute, __path__. This is initialized to be a sequence of strings
containing the name of the directory holding the package’s __init__.py before the code in that file is
executed. This variable can be modified; doing so affects future searches for modules and
subpackages contained in the package.

While this feature is not often needed, it can be used to extend the set of modules found in a
package.

Footnotes

[1]
In fact function definitions are also ‘statements’ that are ‘executed’; the execution of a module-level
function definition adds the function name to the module’s global namespace.

7. Input and Output

There are several ways to present the output of a program; data can be printed in a human-readable
form, or written to a file for future use. This chapter will discuss some of the possibilities.

7.1. Fancier Output Formatting

So far we’ve encountered two ways of writing values: expression statements and the print() function.
(A third way is using the write() method of file objects; the standard output file can be referenced
as sys.stdout. See the Library Reference for more information on this.)

Often you’ll want more control over the formatting of your output than simply printing space-
separated values. There are several ways to format output.

 To use formatted string literals, begin a string with f or F before the opening quotation mark
or triple quotation mark. Inside this string, you can write a Python expression
between { and } characters that can refer to variables or literal values.

>>>

>>> year = 2016

>>> event = 'Referendum'

>>> f'Results of the {year} {event}'

'Results of the 2016 Referendum'

 The str.format() method of strings requires more manual effort. You’ll still use { and } to mark
where a variable will be substituted and can provide detailed formatting directives, but you’ll
also need to provide the information to be formatted. In the following code block there are
two examples of how to format variables:

>>>

>>> yes_votes = 42_572_654

>>> total_votes = 85_705_149

>>> percentage = yes_votes / total_votes

>>> '{:-9} YES votes {:2.2%}'.format(yes_votes, percentage)

' 42572654 YES votes 49.67%'

Notice how the yes_votes are padded with spaces and a negative sign only for negative numbers.
The example also prints percentage multiplied by 100, with 2 decimal places and followed by a
percent sign (see Format Specification Mini-Language for details).

 Finally, you can do all the string handling yourself by using string slicing and concatenation
operations to create any layout you can imagine. The string type has some methods that
perform useful operations for padding strings to a given column width.
When you don’t need fancy output but just want a quick display of some variables for debugging
purposes, you can convert any value to a string with the repr() or str() functions.

The str() function is meant to return representations of values which are fairly human-readable,
while repr() is meant to generate representations which can be read by the interpreter (or will force
a SyntaxError if there is no equivalent syntax). For objects which don’t have a particular
representation for human consumption, str() will return the same value as repr(). Many values, such
as numbers or structures like lists and dictionaries, have the same representation using either
function. Strings, in particular, have two distinct representations.

Some examples:

>>>

>>> s = 'Hello, world.'

>>> str(s)

'Hello, world.'

>>> repr(s)

"'Hello, world.'"

>>> str(1/7)

'0.14285714285714285'

>>> x = 10 * 3.25

>>> y = 200 * 200

>>> s = 'The value of x is ' + repr(x) + ', and y is ' + repr(y) + '...'

>>> print(s)

The value of x is 32.5, and y is 40000...

>>> # The repr() of a string adds string quotes and backslashes:

>>> hello = 'hello, world\n'

>>> hellos = repr(hello)

>>> print(hellos)

'hello, world\n'

>>> # The argument to repr() may be any Python object:

>>> repr((x, y, ('spam', 'eggs')))

"(32.5, 40000, ('spam', 'eggs'))"

The string module contains a Template class that offers yet another way to substitute values into
strings, using placeholders like $x and replacing them with values from a dictionary, but offers much
less control of the formatting.

7.1.1. Formatted String Literals

Formatted string literals (also called f-strings for short) let you include the value of Python
expressions inside a string by prefixing the string with f or F and writing expressions as {expression}.

An optional format specifier can follow the expression. This allows greater control over how the
value is formatted. The following example rounds pi to three places after the decimal:

>>>

>>> import math

>>> print(f'The value of pi is approximately {math.pi:.3f}.')

The value of pi is approximately 3.142.

Passing an integer after the ':' will cause that field to be a minimum number of characters wide. This
is useful for making columns line up.

>>>

>>> table = {'Sjoerd': 4127, 'Jack': 4098, 'Dcab': 7678}

>>> for name, phone in table.items():

... print(f'{name:10} ==> {phone:10d}')

...

Sjoerd ==> 4127

Jack ==> 4098

Dcab ==> 7678

Other modifiers can be used to convert the value before it is formatted. '!a' applies ascii(), '!
s' applies str(), and '!r' applies repr():

>>>

>>> animals = 'eels'

>>> print(f'My hovercraft is full of {animals}.')

My hovercraft is full of eels.

>>> print(f'My hovercraft is full of {animals!r}.')

My hovercraft is full of 'eels'.

The = specifier can be used to expand an expression to the text of the expression, an equal sign, then
the representation of the evaluated expression:

>>>

>>> bugs = 'roaches'

>>> count = 13

>>> area = 'living room'

>>> print(f'Debugging {bugs=} {count=} {area=}')

Debugging bugs='roaches' count=13 area='living room'

See self-documenting expressions for more information on the = specifier. For a reference on these
format specifications, see the reference guide for the Format Specification Mini-Language.

7.1.2. The String format() Method

Basic usage of the str.format() method looks like this:

>>>

>>> print('We are the {} who say "{}!"'.format('knights', 'Ni'))

We are the knights who say "Ni!"

The brackets and characters within them (called format fields) are replaced with the objects passed
into the str.format() method. A number in the brackets can be used to refer to the position of the
object passed into the str.format() method.

>>>

>>> print('{0} and {1}'.format('spam', 'eggs'))

spam and eggs

>>> print('{1} and {0}'.format('spam', 'eggs'))

eggs and spam

If keyword arguments are used in the str.format() method, their values are referred to by using the
name of the argument.

>>>

>>> print('This {food} is {adjective}.'.format(

... food='spam', adjective='absolutely horrible'))

This spam is absolutely horrible.

Positional and keyword arguments can be arbitrarily combined:

>>>

>>> print('The story of {0}, {1}, and {other}.'.format('Bill', 'Manfred',

... other='Georg'))

The story of Bill, Manfred, and Georg.

If you have a really long format string that you don’t want to split up, it would be nice if you could
reference the variables to be formatted by name instead of by position. This can be done by simply
passing the dict and using square brackets '[]' to access the keys.

>>>

>>> table = {'Sjoerd': 4127, 'Jack': 4098, 'Dcab': 8637678}

>>> print('Jack: {0[Jack]:d}; Sjoerd: {0[Sjoerd]:d}; '

... 'Dcab: {0[Dcab]:d}'.format(table))

Jack: 4098; Sjoerd: 4127; Dcab: 8637678

This could also be done by passing the table dictionary as keyword arguments with the ** notation.

>>>

>>> table = {'Sjoerd': 4127, 'Jack': 4098, 'Dcab': 8637678}

>>> print('Jack: {Jack:d}; Sjoerd: {Sjoerd:d}; Dcab: {Dcab:d}'.format(**table))

Jack: 4098; Sjoerd: 4127; Dcab: 8637678

This is particularly useful in combination with the built-in function vars(), which returns a dictionary
containing all local variables:

>>>

>>> table = {k: str(v) for k, v in vars().items()}

>>> message = " ".join([f'{k}: ' + '{' + k +'};' for k in table.keys()])

>>> print(message.format(**table))

__name__: __main__; __doc__: None; __package__: None; __loader__: ...

As an example, the following lines produce a tidily aligned set of columns giving integers and their
squares and cubes:

>>>

>>> for x in range(1, 11):

... print('{0:2d} {1:3d} {2:4d}'.format(x, x*x, x*x*x))

...

1 1 1

2 4 8

3 9 27

4 16 64

5 25 125

6 36 216

7 49 343

8 64 512

9 81 729

10 100 1000

For a complete overview of string formatting with str.format(), see Format String Syntax.

7.1.3. Manual String Formatting

Here’s the same table of squares and cubes, formatted manually:

>>>

>>> for x in range(1, 11):

... print(repr(x).rjust(2), repr(x*x).rjust(3), end=' ')

... # Note use of 'end' on previous line

... print(repr(x*x*x).rjust(4))

...

1 1 1

2 4 8

3 9 27

4 16 64

5 25 125

6 36 216

7 49 343

8 64 512

9 81 729

10 100 1000

(Note that the one space between each column was added by the way print() works: it always adds
spaces between its arguments.)

The str.rjust() method of string objects right-justifies a string in a field of a given width by padding it
with spaces on the left. There are similar methods str.ljust() and str.center(). These methods do not
write anything, they just return a new string. If the input string is too long, they don’t truncate it, but
return it unchanged; this will mess up your column lay-out but that’s usually better than the
alternative, which would be lying about a value. (If you really want truncation you can always add a
slice operation, as in x.ljust(n)[:n].)

There is another method, str.zfill(), which pads a numeric string on the left with zeros. It understands
about plus and minus signs:

>>>

>>> '12'.zfill(5)

'00012'

>>> '-3.14'.zfill(7)

'-003.14'

>>> '3.14159265359'.zfill(5)
'3.14159265359'

7.1.4. Old string formatting

The % operator (modulo) can also be used for string formatting.

Given format % values (where format is a string), % conversion specifications in format are replaced
with zero or more elements of values. This operation is commonly known as string interpolation. For
example:

>>>

>>> import math

>>> print('The value of pi is approximately %5.3f.' % math.pi)

The value of pi is approximately 3.142.

More information can be found in the printf-style String Formatting section.

7.2. Reading and Writing Files

open() returns a file object, and is most commonly used with two positional arguments and one
keyword argument: open(filename, mode, encoding=None)

>>>

>>> f = open('workfile', 'w', encoding="utf-8")

The first argument is a string containing the filename. The second argument is another string
containing a few characters describing the way in which the file will be used. mode can be 'r' when
the file will only be read, 'w' for only writing (an existing file with the same name will be erased),
and 'a' opens the file for appending; any data written to the file is automatically added to the
end. 'r+' opens the file for both reading and writing. The mode argument is optional; 'r' will be
assumed if it’s omitted.

Normally, files are opened in text mode, that means, you read and write strings from and to the file,
which are encoded in a specific encoding. If encoding is not specified, the default is platform
dependent (see open()). Because UTF-8 is the modern de-facto standard, encoding="utf-8" is
recommended unless you know that you need to use a different encoding. Appending a 'b' to the
mode opens the file in binary mode. Binary mode data is read and written as bytes objects. You can
not specify encoding when opening file in binary mode.

In text mode, the default when reading is to convert platform-specific line endings (\n on Unix, \r\
n on Windows) to just \n. When writing in text mode, the default is to convert occurrences of \n back
to platform-specific line endings. This behind-the-scenes modification to file data is fine for text files,
but will corrupt binary data like that in JPEG or EXE files. Be very careful to use binary mode when
reading and writing such files.

It is good practice to use the with keyword when dealing with file objects. The advantage is that the
file is properly closed after its suite finishes, even if an exception is raised at some point. Using with is
also much shorter than writing equivalent try-finally blocks:

>>>

>>> with open('workfile', encoding="utf-8") as f:

... read_data = f.read()

>>> # We can check that the file has been automatically closed.

>>> f.closed

True

If you’re not using the with keyword, then you should call f.close() to close the file and immediately
free up any system resources used by it.

Warning

Calling f.write() without using the with keyword or calling f.close() might result in the arguments
of f.write() not being completely written to the disk, even if the program exits successfully.

After a file object is closed, either by a with statement or by calling f.close(), attempts to use the file
object will automatically fail.

>>>

>>> f.close()

>>> f.read()

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

ValueError: I/O operation on closed file.

7.2.1. Methods of File Objects

The rest of the examples in this section will assume that a file object called f has already been
created.

To read a file’s contents, call f.read(size), which reads some quantity of data and returns it as a string
(in text mode) or bytes object (in binary mode). size is an optional numeric argument. When size is
omitted or negative, the entire contents of the file will be read and returned; it’s your problem if the
file is twice as large as your machine’s memory. Otherwise, at most size characters (in text mode)
or size bytes (in binary mode) are read and returned. If the end of the file has been
reached, f.read() will return an empty string ('').

>>>

>>> f.read()

'This is the entire file.\n'

>>> f.read()

''
f.readline() reads a single line from the file; a newline character (\n) is left at the end of the string,
and is only omitted on the last line of the file if the file doesn’t end in a newline. This makes the
return value unambiguous; if f.readline() returns an empty string, the end of the file has been
reached, while a blank line is represented by '\n', a string containing only a single newline.

>>>

>>> f.readline()

'This is the first line of the file.\n'

>>> f.readline()

'Second line of the file\n'

>>> f.readline()

''

For reading lines from a file, you can loop over the file object. This is memory efficient, fast, and
leads to simple code:

>>>

>>> for line in f:

... print(line, end='')

...

This is the first line of the file.

Second line of the file

If you want to read all the lines of a file in a list you can also use list(f) or f.readlines().

f.write(string) writes the contents of string to the file, returning the number of characters written.

>>>

>>> f.write('This is a test\n')

15

Other types of objects need to be converted – either to a string (in text mode) or a bytes object (in
binary mode) – before writing them:

>>>

>>> value = ('the answer', 42)

>>> s = str(value) # convert the tuple to string

>>> f.write(s)

18

f.tell() returns an integer giving the file object’s current position in the file represented as number of
bytes from the beginning of the file when in binary mode and an opaque number when in text mode.
To change the file object’s position, use f.seek(offset, whence). The position is computed from
adding offset to a reference point; the reference point is selected by the whence argument.
A whence value of 0 measures from the beginning of the file, 1 uses the current file position, and 2
uses the end of the file as the reference point. whence can be omitted and defaults to 0, using the
beginning of the file as the reference point.

>>>

>>> f = open('workfile', 'rb+')

>>> f.write(b'0123456789abcdef')

16

>>> f.seek(5) # Go to the 6th byte in the file

>>> f.read(1)

b'5'

>>> f.seek(-3, 2) # Go to the 3rd byte before the end

13

>>> f.read(1)

b'd'

In text files (those opened without a b in the mode string), only seeks relative to the beginning of the
file are allowed (the exception being seeking to the very file end with seek(0, 2)) and the only
valid offset values are those returned from the f.tell(), or zero. Any other offset value produces
undefined behaviour.

File objects have some additional methods, such as isatty() and truncate() which are less frequently
used; consult the Library Reference for a complete guide to file objects.

7.2.2. Saving structured data with json

Strings can easily be written to and read from a file. Numbers take a bit more effort, since
the read() method only returns strings, which will have to be passed to a function like int(), which
takes a string like '123' and returns its numeric value 123. When you want to save more complex data
types like nested lists and dictionaries, parsing and serializing by hand becomes complicated.

Rather than having users constantly writing and debugging code to save complicated data types to
files, Python allows you to use the popular data interchange format called JSON (JavaScript Object
Notation). The standard module called json can take Python data hierarchies, and convert them to
string representations; this process is called serializing. Reconstructing the data from the string
representation is called deserializing. Between serializing and deserializing, the string representing
the object may have been stored in a file or data, or sent over a network connection to some distant
machine.

Note
The JSON format is commonly used by modern applications to allow for data exchange. Many
programmers are already familiar with it, which makes it a good choice for interoperability.

If you have an object x, you can view its JSON string representation with a simple line of code:

>>>

>>> import json

>>> x = [1, 'simple', 'list']

>>> json.dumps(x)

'[1, "simple", "list"]'

Another variant of the dumps() function, called dump(), simply serializes the object to a text file. So
if f is a text file object opened for writing, we can do this:

json.dump(x, f)

To decode the object again, if f is a binary file or text file object which has been opened for reading:

x = json.load(f)

Note

JSON files must be encoded in UTF-8. Use encoding="utf-8" when opening JSON file as a text file for
both of reading and writing.

This simple serialization technique can handle lists and dictionaries, but serializing arbitrary class
instances in JSON requires a bit of extra effort. The reference for the json module contains an
explanation of this.

See also

pickle - the pickle module

Contrary to JSON, pickle is a protocol which allows the serialization of arbitrarily complex Python
objects. As such, it is specific to Python and cannot be used to communicate with applications
written in other languages. It is also insecure by default: deserializing pickle data coming from an
untrusted source can execute arbitrary code, if the data was crafted by a skilled attacker.

8. Errors and Exceptions

Until now error messages haven’t been more than mentioned, but if you have tried out the examples
you have probably seen some. There are (at least) two distinguishable kinds of errors: syntax
errors and exceptions.

8.1. Syntax Errors

Syntax errors, also known as parsing errors, are perhaps the most common kind of complaint you get
while you are still learning Python:
>>>

>>> while True print('Hello world')

File "<stdin>", line 1

while True print('Hello world')

^^^^^

SyntaxError: invalid syntax

The parser repeats the offending line and displays little arrows pointing at the token in the line where
the error was detected. The error may be caused by the absence of a token before the indicated
token. In the example, the error is detected at the function print(), since a colon (':') is missing before
it. File name and line number are printed so you know where to look in case the input came from a
script.

8.2. Exceptions

Even if a statement or expression is syntactically correct, it may cause an error when an attempt is
made to execute it. Errors detected during execution are called exceptions and are not
unconditionally fatal: you will soon learn how to handle them in Python programs. Most exceptions
are not handled by programs, however, and result in error messages as shown here:

>>>

>>> 10 * (1/0)

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

10 * (1/0)

~^~

ZeroDivisionError: division by zero

>>> 4 + spam*3

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

4 + spam*3

^^^^

NameError: name 'spam' is not defined

>>> '2' + 2

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

'2' + 2
 ~~~~^~~

TypeError: can only concatenate str (not "int") to str

The last line of the error message indicates what happened. Exceptions come in different types, and
the type is printed as part of the message: the types in the example
are ZeroDivisionError, NameError and TypeError. The string printed as the exception type is the
name of the built-in exception that occurred. This is true for all built-in exceptions, but need not be
true for user-defined exceptions (although it is a useful convention). Standard exception names are
built-in identifiers (not reserved keywords).

The rest of the line provides detail based on the type of exception and what caused it.

The preceding part of the error message shows the context where the exception occurred, in the
form of a stack traceback. In general it contains a stack traceback listing source lines; however, it will
not display lines read from standard input.

Built-in Exceptions lists the built-in exceptions and their meanings.

8.3. Handling Exceptions

It is possible to write programs that handle selected exceptions. Look at the following example,
which asks the user for input until a valid integer has been entered, but allows the user to interrupt
the program (using Control-C or whatever the operating system supports); note that a user-
generated interruption is signalled by raising the KeyboardInterrupt exception.

>>>

>>> while True:

... try:

... x = int(input("Please enter a number: "))

... break

... except ValueError:

... print("Oops! That was no valid number. Try again...")

...

The try statement works as follows.

 First, the try clause (the statement(s) between the try and except keywords) is executed.

 If no exception occurs, the except clause is skipped and execution of the try statement is
finished.

 If an exception occurs during execution of the try clause, the rest of the clause is skipped.
Then, if its type matches the exception named after the except keyword, the except clause is
executed, and then execution continues after the try/except block.

 If an exception occurs which does not match the exception named in the except clause, it is
passed on to outer try statements; if no handler is found, it is an unhandled exception and
execution stops with an error message.
A try statement may have more than one except clause, to specify handlers for different exceptions.
At most one handler will be executed. Handlers only handle exceptions that occur in the
corresponding try clause, not in other handlers of the same try statement. An except clause may
name multiple exceptions as a parenthesized tuple, for example:

... except (RuntimeError, TypeError, NameError):

... pass

A class in an except clause matches exceptions which are instances of the class itself or one of its
derived classes (but not the other way around — an except clause listing a derived class does not
match instances of its base classes). For example, the following code will print B, C, D in that order:

class B(Exception):

pass

class C(B):

pass

class D(C):

pass

for cls in [B, C, D]:

try:

raise cls()

except D:

print("D")

except C:

print("C")

except B:

print("B")

Note that if the except clauses were reversed (with except B first), it would have printed B, B, B — the
first matching except clause is triggered.

When an exception occurs, it may have associated values, also known as the exception’s arguments.
The presence and types of the arguments depend on the exception type.

The except clause may specify a variable after the exception name. The variable is bound to the
exception instance which typically has an args attribute that stores the arguments. For convenience,
builtin exception types define __str__() to print all the arguments without explicitly accessing .args.
>>>

>>> try:

... raise Exception('spam', 'eggs')

... except Exception as inst:

... print(type(inst)) # the exception type

... print(inst.args) # arguments stored in .args

... print(inst) # __str__ allows args to be printed directly,

... # but may be overridden in exception subclasses

... x, y = inst.args # unpack args

... print('x =', x)

... print('y =', y)

...

<class 'Exception'>

('spam', 'eggs')

('spam', 'eggs')

x = spam

y = eggs

The exception’s __str__() output is printed as the last part (‘detail’) of the message for unhandled
exceptions.

BaseException is the common base class of all exceptions. One of its subclasses, Exception, is the
base class of all the non-fatal exceptions. Exceptions which are not subclasses of Exception are not
typically handled, because they are used to indicate that the program should terminate. They
include SystemExit which is raised by sys.exit() and KeyboardInterrupt which is raised when a user
wishes to interrupt the program.

Exception can be used as a wildcard that catches (almost) everything. However, it is good practice to
be as specific as possible with the types of exceptions that we intend to handle, and to allow any
unexpected exceptions to propagate on.

The most common pattern for handling Exception is to print or log the exception and then re-raise it
(allowing a caller to handle the exception as well):

import sys

try:

f = open('myfile.txt')

s = f.readline()
 i = int(s.strip())

except OSError as err:

print("OS error:", err)

except ValueError:

print("Could not convert data to an integer.")

except Exception as err:

print(f"Unexpected {err=}, {type(err)=}")

raise

The try … except statement has an optional else clause, which, when present, must follow all except
clauses. It is useful for code that must be executed if the try clause does not raise an exception. For
example:

for arg in sys.argv[1:]:

try:

f = open(arg, 'r')

except OSError:

print('cannot open', arg)

else:

print(arg, 'has', len(f.readlines()), 'lines')

f.close()

The use of the else clause is better than adding additional code to the try clause because it avoids
accidentally catching an exception that wasn’t raised by the code being protected by
the try … except statement.

Exception handlers do not handle only exceptions that occur immediately in the try clause, but also
those that occur inside functions that are called (even indirectly) in the try clause. For example:

>>>

>>> def this_fails():

... x = 1/0

...

>>> try:

... this_fails()

... except ZeroDivisionError as err:

... print('Handling run-time error:', err)

...
Handling run-time error: division by zero

8.4. Raising Exceptions

The raise statement allows the programmer to force a specified exception to occur. For example:

>>>

>>> raise NameError('HiThere')

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

raise NameError('HiThere')

NameError: HiThere

The sole argument to raise indicates the exception to be raised. This must be either an exception
instance or an exception class (a class that derives from BaseException, such as Exception or one of
its subclasses). If an exception class is passed, it will be implicitly instantiated by calling its
constructor with no arguments:

raise ValueError # shorthand for 'raise ValueError()'

If you need to determine whether an exception was raised but don’t intend to handle it, a simpler
form of the raise statement allows you to re-raise the exception:

>>>

>>> try:

... raise NameError('HiThere')

... except NameError:

... print('An exception flew by!')

... raise

...

An exception flew by!

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 2, in <module>

raise NameError('HiThere')

NameError: HiThere

8.5. Exception Chaining

If an unhandled exception occurs inside an except section, it will have the exception being handled
attached to it and included in the error message:

>>>

>>> try:
... open("database.sqlite")

... except OSError:

... raise RuntimeError("unable to handle error")

...

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 2, in <module>

open("database.sqlite")

~~~~^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

FileNotFoundError: [Errno 2] No such file or directory: 'database.sqlite'

During handling of the above exception, another exception occurred:

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 4, in <module>

raise RuntimeError("unable to handle error")

RuntimeError: unable to handle error

To indicate that an exception is a direct consequence of another, the raise statement allows an
optional from clause:

# exc must be exception instance or None.

raise RuntimeError from exc

This can be useful when you are transforming exceptions. For example:

>>>

>>> def func():

... raise ConnectionError

...

>>> try:

... func()

... except ConnectionError as exc:

... raise RuntimeError('Failed to open database') from exc

...

Traceback (most recent call last):

 File "<stdin>", line 2, in <module>

func()

~~~~^^

File "<stdin>", line 2, in func

ConnectionError

The above exception was the direct cause of the following exception:

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 4, in <module>

raise RuntimeError('Failed to open database') from exc

RuntimeError: Failed to open database

It also allows disabling automatic exception chaining using the from None idiom:

>>>

>>> try:

... open('database.sqlite')

... except OSError:

... raise RuntimeError from None

...

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 4, in <module>

raise RuntimeError from None

RuntimeError

For more information about chaining mechanics, see Built-in Exceptions.

8.6. User-defined Exceptions

Programs may name their own exceptions by creating a new exception class (see Classes for more
about Python classes). Exceptions should typically be derived from the Exception class, either directly
or indirectly.

Exception classes can be defined which do anything any other class can do, but are usually kept
simple, often only offering a number of attributes that allow information about the error to be
extracted by handlers for the exception.

Most exceptions are defined with names that end in “Error”, similar to the naming of the standard
exceptions.
Many standard modules define their own exceptions to report errors that may occur in functions
they define.

8.7. Defining Clean-up Actions

The try statement has another optional clause which is intended to define clean-up actions that must
be executed under all circumstances. For example:

>>>

>>> try:

... raise KeyboardInterrupt

... finally:

... print('Goodbye, world!')

...

Goodbye, world!

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 2, in <module>

raise KeyboardInterrupt

KeyboardInterrupt

If a finally clause is present, the finally clause will execute as the last task before the try statement
completes. The finally clause runs whether or not the try statement produces an exception. The
following points discuss more complex cases when an exception occurs:

 If an exception occurs during execution of the try clause, the exception may be handled by
an except clause. If the exception is not handled by an except clause, the exception is re-
raised after the finally clause has been executed.

 An exception could occur during execution of an except or else clause. Again, the exception is
re-raised after the finally clause has been executed.

 If the finally clause executes a break, continue or return statement, exceptions are not re-
raised.

 If the try statement reaches a break, continue or return statement, the finally clause will
execute just prior to the break, continue or return statement’s execution.

 If a finally clause includes a return statement, the returned value will be the one from
the finally clause’s return statement, not the value from the try clause’s return statement.

For example:

>>>

>>> def bool_return():

... try:
... return True

... finally:

... return False

...

>>> bool_return()

False

A more complicated example:

>>>

>>> def divide(x, y):

... try:

... result = x / y

... except ZeroDivisionError:

... print("division by zero!")

... else:

... print("result is", result)

... finally:

... print("executing finally clause")

...

>>> divide(2, 1)

result is 2.0

executing finally clause

>>> divide(2, 0)

division by zero!

executing finally clause

>>> divide("2", "1")

executing finally clause

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

divide("2", "1")

~~~~~~^^^^^^^^^^

File "<stdin>", line 3, in divide

 result = x / y

~~^~~

TypeError: unsupported operand type(s) for /: 'str' and 'str'

As you can see, the finally clause is executed in any event. The TypeError raised by dividing two
strings is not handled by the except clause and therefore re-raised after the finally clause has been
executed.

In real world applications, the finally clause is useful for releasing external resources (such as files or
network connections), regardless of whether the use of the resource was successful.

8.8. Predefined Clean-up Actions

Some objects define standard clean-up actions to be undertaken when the object is no longer
needed, regardless of whether or not the operation using the object succeeded or failed. Look at the
following example, which tries to open a file and print its contents to the screen.

for line in open("myfile.txt"):

print(line, end="")

The problem with this code is that it leaves the file open for an indeterminate amount of time after
this part of the code has finished executing. This is not an issue in simple scripts, but can be a
problem for larger applications. The with statement allows objects like files to be used in a way that
ensures they are always cleaned up promptly and correctly.

with open("myfile.txt") as f:

for line in f:

print(line, end="")

After the statement is executed, the file f is always closed, even if a problem was encountered while
processing the lines. Objects which, like files, provide predefined clean-up actions will indicate this in
their documentation.

8.9. Raising and Handling Multiple Unrelated Exceptions

There are situations where it is necessary to report several exceptions that have occurred. This is
often the case in concurrency frameworks, when several tasks may have failed in parallel, but there
are also other use cases where it is desirable to continue execution and collect multiple errors rather
than raise the first exception.

The builtin ExceptionGroup wraps a list of exception instances so that they can be raised together. It
is an exception itself, so it can be caught like any other exception.

>>>

>>> def f():

... excs = [OSError('error 1'), SystemError('error 2')]

... raise ExceptionGroup('there were problems', excs)

...
>>> f()

+ Exception Group Traceback (most recent call last):

| File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

| f()

| ~^^

| File "<stdin>", line 3, in f

| raise ExceptionGroup('there were problems', excs)

| ExceptionGroup: there were problems (2 sub-exceptions)

+-+---------------- 1 ----------------

| OSError: error 1

+---------------- 2 ----------------

| SystemError: error 2

+------------------------------------

>>> try:

... f()

... except Exception as e:

... print(f'caught {type(e)}: e')

...

caught <class 'ExceptionGroup'>: e

>>>

By using except* instead of except, we can selectively handle only the exceptions in the group that
match a certain type. In the following example, which shows a nested exception group,
each except* clause extracts from the group exceptions of a certain type while letting all other
exceptions propagate to other clauses and eventually to be reraised.

>>>

>>> def f():

... raise ExceptionGroup(

... "group1",

... [

... OSError(1),

... SystemError(2),

... ExceptionGroup(
... "group2",

... [

... OSError(3),

... RecursionError(4)

... ]

... )

... ]

... )

...

>>> try:

... f()

... except* OSError as e:

... print("There were OSErrors")

... except* SystemError as e:

... print("There were SystemErrors")

...

There were OSErrors

There were SystemErrors

+ Exception Group Traceback (most recent call last):

| File "<stdin>", line 2, in <module>

| f()

| ~^^

| File "<stdin>", line 2, in f

| raise ExceptionGroup(

| ...<12 lines>...

| )

| ExceptionGroup: group1 (1 sub-exception)

+-+---------------- 1 ----------------

| ExceptionGroup: group2 (1 sub-exception)

+-+---------------- 1 ----------------

| RecursionError: 4
 +------------------------------------

>>>

Note that the exceptions nested in an exception group must be instances, not types. This is because
in practice the exceptions would typically be ones that have already been raised and caught by the
program, along the following pattern:

>>>

>>> excs = []

... for test in tests:

... try:

... test.run()

... except Exception as e:

... excs.append(e)

...

>>> if excs:

... raise ExceptionGroup("Test Failures", excs)

...

8.10. Enriching Exceptions with Notes

When an exception is created in order to be raised, it is usually initialized with information that
describes the error that has occurred. There are cases where it is useful to add information after the
exception was caught. For this purpose, exceptions have a method add_note(note) that accepts a
string and adds it to the exception’s notes list. The standard traceback rendering includes all notes, in
the order they were added, after the exception.

>>>

>>> try:

... raise TypeError('bad type')

... except Exception as e:

... e.add_note('Add some information')

... e.add_note('Add some more information')

... raise

...

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 2, in <module>

raise TypeError('bad type')

TypeError: bad type

Add some information

Add some more information

>>>

For example, when collecting exceptions into an exception group, we may want to add context
information for the individual errors. In the following each exception in the group has a note
indicating when this error has occurred.

>>>

>>> def f():

... raise OSError('operation failed')

...

>>> excs = []

>>> for i in range(3):

... try:

... f()

... except Exception as e:

... e.add_note(f'Happened in Iteration {i+1}')

... excs.append(e)

...

>>> raise ExceptionGroup('We have some problems', excs)

+ Exception Group Traceback (most recent call last):

| File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

| raise ExceptionGroup('We have some problems', excs)

| ExceptionGroup: We have some problems (3 sub-exceptions)

+-+---------------- 1 ----------------

| Traceback (most recent call last):

| File "<stdin>", line 3, in <module>

| f()

| ~^^

| File "<stdin>", line 2, in f

| raise OSError('operation failed')

| OSError: operation failed

 | Happened in Iteration 1

+---------------- 2 ----------------

| Traceback (most recent call last):

| File "<stdin>", line 3, in <module>

| f()

| ~^^

| File "<stdin>", line 2, in f

| raise OSError('operation failed')

| OSError: operation failed

| Happened in Iteration 2

+---------------- 3 ----------------

| Traceback (most recent call last):

| File "<stdin>", line 3, in <module>

| f()

| ~^^

| File "<stdin>", line 2, in f

| raise OSError('operation failed')

| OSError: operation failed

| Happened in Iteration 3

+------------------------------------

>>>

9. Classes

Classes provide a means of bundling data and functionality together. Creating a new class creates a
new type of object, allowing new instances of that type to be made. Each class instance can have
attributes attached to it for maintaining its state. Class instances can also have methods (defined by
its class) for modifying its state.

Compared with other programming languages, Python’s class mechanism adds classes with a
minimum of new syntax and semantics. It is a mixture of the class mechanisms found in C++ and
Modula-3. Python classes provide all the standard features of Object Oriented Programming: the
class inheritance mechanism allows multiple base classes, a derived class can override any methods
of its base class or classes, and a method can call the method of a base class with the same name.
Objects can contain arbitrary amounts and kinds of data. As is true for modules, classes partake of
the dynamic nature of Python: they are created at runtime, and can be modified further after
creation.

In C++ terminology, normally class members (including the data members) are public (except see
below Private Variables), and all member functions are virtual. As in Modula-3, there are no
shorthands for referencing the object’s members from its methods: the method function is declared
with an explicit first argument representing the object, which is provided implicitly by the call. As in
Smalltalk, classes themselves are objects. This provides semantics for importing and renaming.
Unlike C++ and Modula-3, built-in types can be used as base classes for extension by the user. Also,
like in C++, most built-in operators with special syntax (arithmetic operators, subscripting etc.) can be
redefined for class instances.

(Lacking universally accepted terminology to talk about classes, I will make occasional use of
Smalltalk and C++ terms. I would use Modula-3 terms, since its object-oriented semantics are closer
to those of Python than C++, but I expect that few readers have heard of it.)

9.1. A Word About Names and Objects

Objects have individuality, and multiple names (in multiple scopes) can be bound to the same object.
This is known as aliasing in other languages. This is usually not appreciated on a first glance at
Python, and can be safely ignored when dealing with immutable basic types (numbers, strings,
tuples). However, aliasing has a possibly surprising effect on the semantics of Python code involving
mutable objects such as lists, dictionaries, and most other types. This is usually used to the benefit of
the program, since aliases behave like pointers in some respects. For example, passing an object is
cheap since only a pointer is passed by the implementation; and if a function modifies an object
passed as an argument, the caller will see the change — this eliminates the need for two different
argument passing mechanisms as in Pascal.

9.2. Python Scopes and Namespaces

Before introducing classes, I first have to tell you something about Python’s scope rules. Class
definitions play some neat tricks with namespaces, and you need to know how scopes and
namespaces work to fully understand what’s going on. Incidentally, knowledge about this subject is
useful for any advanced Python programmer.

Let’s begin with some definitions.

A namespace is a mapping from names to objects. Most namespaces are currently implemented as
Python dictionaries, but that’s normally not noticeable in any way (except for performance), and it
may change in the future. Examples of namespaces are: the set of built-in names (containing
functions such as abs(), and built-in exception names); the global names in a module; and the local
names in a function invocation. In a sense the set of attributes of an object also form a namespace.
The important thing to know about namespaces is that there is absolutely no relation between
names in different namespaces; for instance, two different modules may both define a
function maximize without confusion — users of the modules must prefix it with the module name.

By the way, I use the word attribute for any name following a dot — for example, in the
expression z.real, real is an attribute of the object z. Strictly speaking, references to names in
modules are attribute references: in the expression modname.funcname, modname is a module
object and funcname is an attribute of it. In this case there happens to be a straightforward mapping
between the module’s attributes and the global names defined in the module: they share the same
namespace! [1]
Attributes may be read-only or writable. In the latter case, assignment to attributes is possible.
Module attributes are writable: you can write modname.the_answer = 42. Writable attributes may
also be deleted with the del statement. For example, del modname.the_answer will remove the
attribute the_answer from the object named by modname.

Namespaces are created at different moments and have different lifetimes. The namespace
containing the built-in names is created when the Python interpreter starts up, and is never deleted.
The global namespace for a module is created when the module definition is read in; normally,
module namespaces also last until the interpreter quits. The statements executed by the top-level
invocation of the interpreter, either read from a script file or interactively, are considered part of a
module called __main__, so they have their own global namespace. (The built-in names actually also
live in a module; this is called builtins.)

The local namespace for a function is created when the function is called, and deleted when the
function returns or raises an exception that is not handled within the function. (Actually, forgetting
would be a better way to describe what actually happens.) Of course, recursive invocations each
have their own local namespace.

A scope is a textual region of a Python program where a namespace is directly accessible. “Directly
accessible” here means that an unqualified reference to a name attempts to find the name in the
namespace.

Although scopes are determined statically, they are used dynamically. At any time during execution,
there are 3 or 4 nested scopes whose namespaces are directly accessible:

 the innermost scope, which is searched first, contains the local names

 the scopes of any enclosing functions, which are searched starting with the nearest enclosing
scope, contain non-local, but also non-global names

 the next-to-last scope contains the current module’s global names

 the outermost scope (searched last) is the namespace containing built-in names

If a name is declared global, then all references and assignments go directly to the next-to-last scope
containing the module’s global names. To rebind variables found outside of the innermost scope,
the nonlocal statement can be used; if not declared nonlocal, those variables are read-only (an
attempt to write to such a variable will simply create a new local variable in the innermost scope,
leaving the identically named outer variable unchanged).

Usually, the local scope references the local names of the (textually) current function. Outside
functions, the local scope references the same namespace as the global scope: the module’s
namespace. Class definitions place yet another namespace in the local scope.

It is important to realize that scopes are determined textually: the global scope of a function defined
in a module is that module’s namespace, no matter from where or by what alias the function is
called. On the other hand, the actual search for names is done dynamically, at run time — however,
the language definition is evolving towards static name resolution, at “compile” time, so don’t rely on
dynamic name resolution! (In fact, local variables are already determined statically.)

A special quirk of Python is that – if no global or nonlocal statement is in effect – assignments to

names always go into the innermost scope. Assignments do not copy data — they just bind names to
objects. The same is true for deletions: the statement del x removes the binding of x from the
namespace referenced by the local scope. In fact, all operations that introduce new names use the
local scope: in particular, import statements and function definitions bind the module or function
name in the local scope.

The global statement can be used to indicate that particular variables live in the global scope and
should be rebound there; the nonlocal statement indicates that particular variables live in an
enclosing scope and should be rebound there.

9.2.1. Scopes and Namespaces Example

This is an example demonstrating how to reference the different scopes and namespaces, and
how global and nonlocal affect variable binding:

def scope_test():

def do_local():

spam = "local spam"

def do_nonlocal():

nonlocal spam

spam = "nonlocal spam"

def do_global():

global spam

spam = "global spam"

spam = "test spam"

do_local()

print("After local assignment:", spam)

do_nonlocal()

print("After nonlocal assignment:", spam)

do_global()

print("After global assignment:", spam)

scope_test()

print("In global scope:", spam)

The output of the example code is:

After local assignment: test spam

After nonlocal assignment: nonlocal spam

After global assignment: nonlocal spam

In global scope: global spam

Note how the local assignment (which is default) didn’t change scope_test's binding of spam.
The nonlocal assignment changed scope_test's binding of spam, and the global assignment changed
the module-level binding.

You can also see that there was no previous binding for spam before the global assignment.

9.3. A First Look at Classes

Classes introduce a little bit of new syntax, three new object types, and some new semantics.

9.3.1. Class Definition Syntax

The simplest form of class definition looks like this:

class ClassName:

<statement-1>

<statement-N>

Class definitions, like function definitions (def statements) must be executed before they have any
effect. (You could conceivably place a class definition in a branch of an if statement, or inside a
function.)

In practice, the statements inside a class definition will usually be function definitions, but other
statements are allowed, and sometimes useful — we’ll come back to this later. The function
definitions inside a class normally have a peculiar form of argument list, dictated by the calling
conventions for methods — again, this is explained later.

When a class definition is entered, a new namespace is created, and used as the local scope — thus,
all assignments to local variables go into this new namespace. In particular, function definitions bind
the name of the new function here.

When a class definition is left normally (via the end), a class object is created. This is basically a
wrapper around the contents of the namespace created by the class definition; we’ll learn more
about class objects in the next section. The original local scope (the one in effect just before the class
definition was entered) is reinstated, and the class object is bound here to the class name given in
the class definition header (ClassName in the example).

9.3.2. Class Objects

Class objects support two kinds of operations: attribute references and instantiation.
Attribute references use the standard syntax used for all attribute references in Python: obj.name.
Valid attribute names are all the names that were in the class’s namespace when the class object was
created. So, if the class definition looked like this:

class MyClass:

"""A simple example class"""

i = 12345

def f(self):

return 'hello world'

then MyClass.i and MyClass.f are valid attribute references, returning an integer and a function
object, respectively. Class attributes can also be assigned to, so you can change the value
of MyClass.i by assignment. __doc__ is also a valid attribute, returning the docstring belonging to the
class: "A simple example class".

Class instantiation uses function notation. Just pretend that the class object is a parameterless
function that returns a new instance of the class. For example (assuming the above class):

x = MyClass()

creates a new instance of the class and assigns this object to the local variable x.

The instantiation operation (“calling” a class object) creates an empty object. Many classes like to
create objects with instances customized to a specific initial state. Therefore a class may define a
special method named __init__(), like this:

def __init__(self):

self.data = []

When a class defines an __init__() method, class instantiation automatically invokes __init__() for
the newly created class instance. So in this example, a new, initialized instance can be obtained by:

x = MyClass()

Of course, the __init__() method may have arguments for greater flexibility. In that case, arguments
given to the class instantiation operator are passed on to __init__(). For example,

>>>

>>> class Complex:

... def __init__(self, realpart, imagpart):

... self.r = realpart

... self.i = imagpart

...

>>> x = Complex(3.0, -4.5)

>>> x.r, x.i

(3.0, -4.5)

9.3.3. Instance Objects

Now what can we do with instance objects? The only operations understood by instance objects are
attribute references. There are two kinds of valid attribute names: data attributes and methods.

data attributes correspond to “instance variables” in Smalltalk, and to “data members” in C++. Data
attributes need not be declared; like local variables, they spring into existence when they are first
assigned to. For example, if x is the instance of MyClass created above, the following piece of code
will print the value 16, without leaving a trace:

x.counter = 1

while x.counter < 10:

x.counter = x.counter * 2

print(x.counter)

del x.counter

The other kind of instance attribute reference is a method. A method is a function that “belongs to”
an object.

Valid method names of an instance object depend on its class. By definition, all attributes of a class
that are function objects define corresponding methods of its instances. So in our example, x.f is a
valid method reference, since MyClass.f is a function, but x.i is not, since MyClass.i is not. But x.f is
not the same thing as MyClass.f — it is a method object, not a function object.

9.3.4. Method Objects

Usually, a method is called right after it is bound:

x.f()

In the MyClass example, this will return the string 'hello world'. However, it is not necessary to call a
method right away: x.f is a method object, and can be stored away and called at a later time. For
example:

xf = x.f

while True:

print(xf())

will continue to print hello world until the end of time.

What exactly happens when a method is called? You may have noticed that x.f() was called without
an argument above, even though the function definition for f() specified an argument. What
happened to the argument? Surely Python raises an exception when a function that requires an
argument is called without any — even if the argument isn’t actually used…

Actually, you may have guessed the answer: the special thing about methods is that the instance
object is passed as the first argument of the function. In our example, the call x.f() is exactly
equivalent to MyClass.f(x). In general, calling a method with a list of n arguments is equivalent to
calling the corresponding function with an argument list that is created by inserting the method’s
instance object before the first argument.

In general, methods work as follows. When a non-data attribute of an instance is referenced, the
instance’s class is searched. If the name denotes a valid class attribute that is a function object,
references to both the instance object and the function object are packed into a method object.
When the method object is called with an argument list, a new argument list is constructed from the
instance object and the argument list, and the function object is called with this new argument list.

9.3.5. Class and Instance Variables

Generally speaking, instance variables are for data unique to each instance and class variables are for
attributes and methods shared by all instances of the class:

class Dog:

kind = 'canine' # class variable shared by all instances

def __init__(self, name):

self.name = name # instance variable unique to each instance

>>> d = Dog('Fido')

>>> e = Dog('Buddy')

>>> d.kind # shared by all dogs

'canine'

>>> e.kind # shared by all dogs

'canine'

>>> d.name # unique to d

'Fido'

>>> e.name # unique to e

'Buddy'

As discussed in A Word About Names and Objects, shared data can have possibly surprising effects
with involving mutable objects such as lists and dictionaries. For example, the tricks list in the
following code should not be used as a class variable because just a single list would be shared by
all Dog instances:

class Dog:
 tricks = [] # mistaken use of a class variable

def __init__(self, name):

self.name = name

def add_trick(self, trick):

self.tricks.append(trick)

>>> d = Dog('Fido')

>>> e = Dog('Buddy')

>>> d.add_trick('roll over')

>>> e.add_trick('play dead')

>>> d.tricks # unexpectedly shared by all dogs

['roll over', 'play dead']

Correct design of the class should use an instance variable instead:

class Dog:

def __init__(self, name):

self.name = name

self.tricks = [] # creates a new empty list for each dog

def add_trick(self, trick):

self.tricks.append(trick)

>>> d = Dog('Fido')

>>> e = Dog('Buddy')

>>> d.add_trick('roll over')

>>> e.add_trick('play dead')

>>> d.tricks

['roll over']

>>> e.tricks
['play dead']

9.4. Random Remarks

If the same attribute name occurs in both an instance and in a class, then attribute lookup prioritizes
the instance:

>>>

>>> class Warehouse:

... purpose = 'storage'

... region = 'west'

...

>>> w1 = Warehouse()

>>> print(w1.purpose, w1.region)

storage west

>>> w2 = Warehouse()

>>> w2.region = 'east'

>>> print(w2.purpose, w2.region)

storage east

Data attributes may be referenced by methods as well as by ordinary users (“clients”) of an object. In
other words, classes are not usable to implement pure abstract data types. In fact, nothing in Python
makes it possible to enforce data hiding — it is all based upon convention. (On the other hand, the
Python implementation, written in C, can completely hide implementation details and control access
to an object if necessary; this can be used by extensions to Python written in C.)

Clients should use data attributes with care — clients may mess up invariants maintained by the
methods by stamping on their data attributes. Note that clients may add data attributes of their own
to an instance object without affecting the validity of the methods, as long as name conflicts are
avoided — again, a naming convention can save a lot of headaches here.

There is no shorthand for referencing data attributes (or other methods!) from within methods. I find
that this actually increases the readability of methods: there is no chance of confusing local variables
and instance variables when glancing through a method.

Often, the first argument of a method is called self. This is nothing more than a convention: the
name self has absolutely no special meaning to Python. Note, however, that by not following the
convention your code may be less readable to other Python programmers, and it is also conceivable
that a class browser program might be written that relies upon such a convention.

Any function object that is a class attribute defines a method for instances of that class. It is not
necessary that the function definition is textually enclosed in the class definition: assigning a function
object to a local variable in the class is also ok. For example:

# Function defined outside the class

def f1(self, x, y):

return min(x, x+y)

class C:

f = f1

def g(self):

return 'hello world'

h=g

Now f, g and h are all attributes of class C that refer to function objects, and consequently they are all
methods of instances of C — h being exactly equivalent to g. Note that this practice usually only
serves to confuse the reader of a program.

Methods may call other methods by using method attributes of the self argument:

class Bag:

def __init__(self):

self.data = []

def add(self, x):

self.data.append(x)

def addtwice(self, x):

self.add(x)

self.add(x)

Methods may reference global names in the same way as ordinary functions. The global scope
associated with a method is the module containing its definition. (A class is never used as a global
scope.) While one rarely encounters a good reason for using global data in a method, there are many
legitimate uses of the global scope: for one thing, functions and modules imported into the global
scope can be used by methods, as well as functions and classes defined in it. Usually, the class
containing the method is itself defined in this global scope, and in the next section we’ll find some
good reasons why a method would want to reference its own class.

Each value is an object, and therefore has a class (also called its type). It is stored as object.__class__.

9.5. Inheritance
Of course, a language feature would not be worthy of the name “class” without supporting
inheritance. The syntax for a derived class definition looks like this:

class DerivedClassName(BaseClassName):

<statement-1>

<statement-N>

The name BaseClassName must be defined in a namespace accessible from the scope containing the
derived class definition. In place of a base class name, other arbitrary expressions are also allowed.
This can be useful, for example, when the base class is defined in another module:

class DerivedClassName(modname.BaseClassName):

Execution of a derived class definition proceeds the same as for a base class. When the class object is
constructed, the base class is remembered. This is used for resolving attribute references: if a
requested attribute is not found in the class, the search proceeds to look in the base class. This rule is
applied recursively if the base class itself is derived from some other class.

There’s nothing special about instantiation of derived classes: DerivedClassName() creates a new
instance of the class. Method references are resolved as follows: the corresponding class attribute is
searched, descending down the chain of base classes if necessary, and the method reference is valid
if this yields a function object.

Derived classes may override methods of their base classes. Because methods have no special
privileges when calling other methods of the same object, a method of a base class that calls another
method defined in the same base class may end up calling a method of a derived class that overrides
it. (For C++ programmers: all methods in Python are effectively virtual.)

An overriding method in a derived class may in fact want to extend rather than simply replace the
base class method of the same name. There is a simple way to call the base class method directly:
just call BaseClassName.methodname(self, arguments). This is occasionally useful to clients as well.
(Note that this only works if the base class is accessible as BaseClassName in the global scope.)

Python has two built-in functions that work with inheritance:

 Use isinstance() to check an instance’s type: isinstance(obj, int) will be True only
if obj.__class__ is int or some class derived from int.

 Use issubclass() to check class inheritance: issubclass(bool, int) is True since bool is a subclass
of int. However, issubclass(float, int) is False since float is not a subclass of int.

9.5.1. Multiple Inheritance

Python supports a form of multiple inheritance as well. A class definition with multiple base classes
looks like this:

class DerivedClassName(Base1, Base2, Base3):

 <statement-1>

<statement-N>

For most purposes, in the simplest cases, you can think of the search for attributes inherited from a
parent class as depth-first, left-to-right, not searching twice in the same class where there is an
overlap in the hierarchy. Thus, if an attribute is not found in DerivedClassName, it is searched for
in Base1, then (recursively) in the base classes of Base1, and if it was not found there, it was
searched for in Base2, and so on.

In fact, it is slightly more complex than that; the method resolution order changes dynamically to
support cooperative calls to super(). This approach is known in some other multiple-inheritance
languages as call-next-method and is more powerful than the super call found in single-inheritance
languages.

Dynamic ordering is necessary because all cases of multiple inheritance exhibit one or more diamond
relationships (where at least one of the parent classes can be accessed through multiple paths from
the bottommost class). For example, all classes inherit from object, so any case of multiple
inheritance provides more than one path to reach object. To keep the base classes from being
accessed more than once, the dynamic algorithm linearizes the search order in a way that preserves
the left-to-right ordering specified in each class, that calls each parent only once, and that is
monotonic (meaning that a class can be subclassed without affecting the precedence order of its
parents). Taken together, these properties make it possible to design reliable and extensible classes
with multiple inheritance. For more detail, see The Python 2.3 Method Resolution Order.

9.6. Private Variables

“Private” instance variables that cannot be accessed except from inside an object don’t exist in
Python. However, there is a convention that is followed by most Python code: a name prefixed with
an underscore (e.g. _spam) should be treated as a non-public part of the API (whether it is a
function, a method or a data member). It should be considered an implementation detail and subject
to change without notice.

Since there is a valid use-case for class-private members (namely to avoid name clashes of names
with names defined by subclasses), there is limited support for such a mechanism, called name
mangling. Any identifier of the form __spam (at least two leading underscores, at most one trailing
underscore) is textually replaced with _classname__spam, where classname is the current class
name with leading underscore(s) stripped. This mangling is done without regard to the syntactic
position of the identifier, as long as it occurs within the definition of a class.

See also

The private name mangling specifications for details and special cases.

Name mangling is helpful for letting subclasses override methods without breaking intraclass method
calls. For example:
class Mapping:

def __init__(self, iterable):

self.items_list = []

self.__update(iterable)

def update(self, iterable):

for item in iterable:

self.items_list.append(item)

__update = update # private copy of original update() method

class MappingSubclass(Mapping):

def update(self, keys, values):

# provides new signature for update()

# but does not break __init__()

for item in zip(keys, values):

self.items_list.append(item)

The above example would work even if MappingSubclass were to introduce a __update identifier
since it is replaced with _Mapping__update in the Mapping class and _MappingSubclass__update in
the MappingSubclass class respectively.

Note that the mangling rules are designed mostly to avoid accidents; it still is possible to access or
modify a variable that is considered private. This can even be useful in special circumstances, such as
in the debugger.

Notice that code passed to exec() or eval() does not consider the classname of the invoking class to
be the current class; this is similar to the effect of the global statement, the effect of which is likewise
restricted to code that is byte-compiled together. The same restriction applies
to getattr(), setattr() and delattr(), as well as when referencing __dict__ directly.

9.7. Odds and Ends

Sometimes it is useful to have a data type similar to the Pascal “record” or C “struct”, bundling
together a few named data items. The idiomatic approach is to use dataclasses for this purpose:

from dataclasses import dataclass

@dataclass
class Employee:

name: str

dept: str

salary: int

>>>

>>> john = Employee('john', 'computer lab', 1000)

>>> john.dept

'computer lab'

>>> john.salary

1000

A piece of Python code that expects a particular abstract data type can often be passed a class that
emulates the methods of that data type instead. For instance, if you have a function that formats
some data from a file object, you can define a class with methods read() and readline() that get the
data from a string buffer instead, and pass it as an argument.

Instance method objects have attributes, too: m.__self__ is the instance object with the method m(),
and m.__func__ is the function object corresponding to the method.

9.8. Iterators

By now you have probably noticed that most container objects can be looped over using
a for statement:

for element in [1, 2, 3]:

print(element)

for element in (1, 2, 3):

print(element)

for key in {'one':1, 'two':2}:

print(key)

for char in "123":

print(char)

for line in open("myfile.txt"):

print(line, end='')

This style of access is clear, concise, and convenient. The use of iterators pervades and unifies
Python. Behind the scenes, the for statement calls iter() on the container object. The function
returns an iterator object that defines the method __next__() which accesses elements in the
container one at a time. When there are no more elements, __next__() raises
a StopIteration exception which tells the for loop to terminate. You can call the __next__() method
using the next() built-in function; this example shows how it all works:

>>>

>>> s = 'abc'

>>> it = iter(s)

>>> it

<str_iterator object at 0x10c90e650>

>>> next(it)

'a'

>>> next(it)

'b'

>>> next(it)

'c'

>>> next(it)

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

next(it)

StopIteration

Having seen the mechanics behind the iterator protocol, it is easy to add iterator behavior to your
classes. Define an __iter__() method which returns an object with a __next__() method. If the class
defines __next__(), then __iter__() can just return self:

class Reverse:

"""Iterator for looping over a sequence backwards."""

def __init__(self, data):

self.data = data

self.index = len(data)

def __iter__(self):

return self

def __next__(self):

if self.index == 0:
 raise StopIteration

self.index = self.index - 1

return self.data[self.index]

>>>

>>> rev = Reverse('spam')

>>> iter(rev)

<__main__.Reverse object at 0x00A1DB50>

>>> for char in rev:

... print(char)

...

9.9. Generators

Generators are a simple and powerful tool for creating iterators. They are written like regular
functions but use the yield statement whenever they want to return data. Each time next() is called
on it, the generator resumes where it left off (it remembers all the data values and which statement
was last executed). An example shows that generators can be trivially easy to create:

def reverse(data):

for index in range(len(data)-1, -1, -1):

yield data[index]

>>>

>>> for char in reverse('golf'):

... print(char)

...

Anything that can be done with generators can also be done with class-based iterators as described
in the previous section. What makes generators so compact is that
the __iter__() and __next__() methods are created automatically.
Another key feature is that the local variables and execution state are automatically saved between
calls. This made the function easier to write and much more clear than an approach using instance
variables like self.index and self.data.

In addition to automatic method creation and saving program state, when generators terminate,
they automatically raise StopIteration. In combination, these features make it easy to create iterators
with no more effort than writing a regular function.

9.10. Generator Expressions

Some simple generators can be coded succinctly as expressions using a syntax similar to list
comprehensions but with parentheses instead of square brackets. These expressions are designed
for situations where the generator is used right away by an enclosing function. Generator
expressions are more compact but less versatile than full generator definitions and tend to be more
memory friendly than equivalent list comprehensions.

Examples:

>>>

>>> sum(i*i for i in range(10)) # sum of squares

285

>>> xvec = [10, 20, 30]

>>> yvec = [7, 5, 3]

>>> sum(x*y for x,y in zip(xvec, yvec)) # dot product

260

>>> unique_words = set(word for line in page for word in line.split())

>>> valedictorian = max((student.gpa, student.name) for student in graduates)

>>> data = 'golf'

>>> list(data[i] for i in range(len(data)-1, -1, -1))

['f', 'l', 'o', 'g']

Footnotes

[1]

Except for one thing. Module objects have a secret read-only attribute called __dict__ which returns
the dictionary used to implement the module’s namespace; the name __dict__ is an attribute but
not a global name. Obviously, using this violates the abstraction of namespace implementation, and
should be restricted to things like post-mortem debuggers.
10. Brief Tour of the Standard Library

10.1. Operating System Interface

The os module provides dozens of functions for interacting with the operating system:

>>>

>>> import os

>>> os.getcwd() # Return the current working directory

'C:\\Python313'

>>> os.chdir('/server/accesslogs') # Change current working directory

>>> os.system('mkdir today') # Run the command mkdir in the system shell

Be sure to use the import os style instead of from os import *. This will keep os.open() from
shadowing the built-in open() function which operates much differently.

The built-in dir() and help() functions are useful as interactive aids for working with large modules
like os:

>>>

>>> import os

>>> dir(os)

<returns a list of all module functions>

>>> help(os)

<returns an extensive manual page created from the module's docstrings>

For daily file and directory management tasks, the shutil module provides a higher level interface
that is easier to use:

>>>

>>> import shutil

>>> shutil.copyfile('data.db', 'archive.db')

'archive.db'

>>> shutil.move('/build/executables', 'installdir')

'installdir'

10.2. File Wildcards

The glob module provides a function for making file lists from directory wildcard searches:

>>>

>>> import glob

>>> glob.glob('*.py')

['primes.py', 'random.py', 'quote.py']

10.3. Command Line Arguments

Common utility scripts often need to process command line arguments. These arguments are stored
in the sys module’s argv attribute as a list. For instance, let’s take the following demo.py file:

# File demo.py

import sys

print(sys.argv)

Here is the output from running python demo.py one two three at the command line:

['demo.py', 'one', 'two', 'three']

The argparse module provides a more sophisticated mechanism to process command line
arguments. The following script extracts one or more filenames and an optional number of lines to
be displayed:

import argparse

parser = argparse.ArgumentParser(

prog='top',

description='Show top lines from each file')

parser.add_argument('filenames', nargs='+')

parser.add_argument('-l', '--lines', type=int, default=10)

args = parser.parse_args()

print(args)

When run at the command line with python top.py --lines=5 alpha.txt beta.txt, the script
sets args.lines to 5 and args.filenames to ['alpha.txt', 'beta.txt'].

10.4. Error Output Redirection and Program Termination

The sys module also has attributes for stdin, stdout, and stderr. The latter is useful for emitting
warnings and error messages to make them visible even when stdout has been redirected:

>>>

>>> sys.stderr.write('Warning, log file not found starting a new one\n')

Warning, log file not found starting a new one

The most direct way to terminate a script is to use sys.exit().

10.5. String Pattern Matching

The re module provides regular expression tools for advanced string processing. For complex
matching and manipulation, regular expressions offer succinct, optimized solutions:

>>>

>>> import re

>>> re.findall(r'\bf[a-z]*', 'which foot or hand fell fastest')

['foot', 'fell', 'fastest']

>>> re.sub(r'(\b[a-z]+) \1', r'\1', 'cat in the the hat')

'cat in the hat'

When only simple capabilities are needed, string methods are preferred because they are easier to
read and debug:

>>>

>>> 'tea for too'.replace('too', 'two')

'tea for two'

10.6. Mathematics

The math module gives access to the underlying C library functions for floating-point math:

>>>

>>> import math

>>> math.cos(math.pi / 4)

0.70710678118654757

>>> math.log(1024, 2)

10.0

The random module provides tools for making random selections:

>>>

>>> import random

>>> random.choice(['apple', 'pear', 'banana'])

'apple'

>>> random.sample(range(100), 10) # sampling without replacement

[30, 83, 16, 4, 8, 81, 41, 50, 18, 33]

>>> random.random() # random float from the interval [0.0, 1.0)

0.17970987693706186

>>> random.randrange(6) # random integer chosen from range(6)

4
The statistics module calculates basic statistical properties (the mean, median, variance, etc.) of
numeric data:

>>>

>>> import statistics

>>> data = [2.75, 1.75, 1.25, 0.25, 0.5, 1.25, 3.5]

>>> statistics.mean(data)

1.6071428571428572

>>> statistics.median(data)

1.25

>>> statistics.variance(data)

1.3720238095238095

The SciPy project <https://scipy.org> has many other modules for numerical computations.

10.7. Internet Access

There are a number of modules for accessing the internet and processing internet protocols. Two of
the simplest are urllib.request for retrieving data from URLs and smtplib for sending mail:

>>>

>>> from urllib.request import urlopen

>>> with urlopen('http://worldtimeapi.org/api/timezone/etc/UTC.txt') as response:

... for line in response:

... line = line.decode() # Convert bytes to a str

... if line.startswith('datetime'):

... print(line.rstrip()) # Remove trailing newline

...

datetime: 2022-01-01T01:36:47.689215+00:00

>>> import smtplib

>>> server = smtplib.SMTP('localhost')

>>> server.sendmail('[email protected]', '[email protected]',

... """To: [email protected]

... From: [email protected]

...

... Beware the Ides of March.

... """)

>>> server.quit()

(Note that the second example needs a mailserver running on localhost.)

10.8. Dates and Times

The datetime module supplies classes for manipulating dates and times in both simple and complex
ways. While date and time arithmetic is supported, the focus of the implementation is on efficient
member extraction for output formatting and manipulation. The module also supports objects that
are timezone aware.

>>>

>>> # dates are easily constructed and formatted

>>> from datetime import date

>>> now = date.today()

>>> now

datetime.date(2003, 12, 2)

>>> now.strftime("%m-%d-%y. %d %b %Y is a %A on the %d day of %B.")

'12-02-03. 02 Dec 2003 is a Tuesday on the 02 day of December.'

>>> # dates support calendar arithmetic

>>> birthday = date(1964, 7, 31)

>>> age = now - birthday

>>> age.days

14368

10.9. Data Compression

Common data archiving and compression formats are directly supported by modules
including: zlib, gzip, bz2, lzma, zipfile and tarfile.

>>>

>>> import zlib

>>> s = b'witch which has which witches wrist watch'

>>> len(s)

41

>>> t = zlib.compress(s)

>>> len(t)
37

>>> zlib.decompress(t)

b'witch which has which witches wrist watch'

>>> zlib.crc32(s)

226805979

10.10. Performance Measurement

Some Python users develop a deep interest in knowing the relative performance of different
approaches to the same problem. Python provides a measurement tool that answers those questions
immediately.

For example, it may be tempting to use the tuple packing and unpacking feature instead of the
traditional approach to swapping arguments. The timeit module quickly demonstrates a modest
performance advantage:

>>>

>>> from timeit import Timer

>>> Timer('t=a; a=b; b=t', 'a=1; b=2').timeit()

0.57535828626024577

>>> Timer('a,b = b,a', 'a=1; b=2').timeit()

0.54962537085770791

In contrast to timeit’s fine level of granularity, the profile and pstats modules provide tools for
identifying time critical sections in larger blocks of code.

10.11. Quality Control

One approach for developing high quality software is to write tests for each function as it is
developed and to run those tests frequently during the development process.

The doctest module provides a tool for scanning a module and validating tests embedded in a
program’s docstrings. Test construction is as simple as cutting-and-pasting a typical call along with its
results into the docstring. This improves the documentation by providing the user with an example
and it allows the doctest module to make sure the code remains true to the documentation:

def average(values):

"""Computes the arithmetic mean of a list of numbers.

>>> print(average([20, 30, 70]))

40.0

"""

return sum(values) / len(values)

import doctest

doctest.testmod() # automatically validate the embedded tests

The unittest module is not as effortless as the doctest module, but it allows a more comprehensive
set of tests to be maintained in a separate file:

import unittest

class TestStatisticalFunctions(unittest.TestCase):

def test_average(self):

self.assertEqual(average([20, 30, 70]), 40.0)

self.assertEqual(round(average([1, 5, 7]), 1), 4.3)

with self.assertRaises(ZeroDivisionError):

average([])

with self.assertRaises(TypeError):

average(20, 30, 70)

unittest.main() # Calling from the command line invokes all tests

10.12. Batteries Included

Python has a “batteries included” philosophy. This is best seen through the sophisticated and robust
capabilities of its larger packages. For example:

 The xmlrpc.client and xmlrpc.server modules make implementing remote procedure calls
into an almost trivial task. Despite the modules’ names, no direct knowledge or handling of
XML is needed.

 The email package is a library for managing email messages, including MIME and other RFC
2822-based message documents. Unlike smtplib and poplib which actually send and receive
messages, the email package has a complete toolset for building or decoding complex
message structures (including attachments) and for implementing internet encoding and
header protocols.

 The json package provides robust support for parsing this popular data interchange format.
The csv module supports direct reading and writing of files in Comma-Separated Value
format, commonly supported by databases and spreadsheets. XML processing is supported
by the xml.etree.ElementTree, xml.dom and xml.sax packages. Together, these modules and
packages greatly simplify data interchange between Python applications and other tools.

 The sqlite3 module is a wrapper for the SQLite database library, providing a persistent
database that can be updated and accessed using slightly nonstandard SQL syntax.
  Internationalization is supported by a number of modules including gettext, locale, and
the codecs package.

11. Brief Tour of the Standard Library — Part II

This second tour covers more advanced modules that support professional programming needs.
These modules rarely occur in small scripts.

11.1. Output Formatting

The reprlib module provides a version of repr() customized for abbreviated displays of large or deeply
nested containers:

>>>

>>> import reprlib

>>> reprlib.repr(set('supercalifragilisticexpialidocious'))

"{'a', 'c', 'd', 'e', 'f', 'g', ...}"

The pprint module offers more sophisticated control over printing both built-in and user defined
objects in a way that is readable by the interpreter. When the result is longer than one line, the
“pretty printer” adds line breaks and indentation to more clearly reveal data structure:

>>>

>>> import pprint

>>> t = [[[['black', 'cyan'], 'white', ['green', 'red']], [['magenta',

... 'yellow'], 'blue']]]

...

>>> pprint.pprint(t, width=30)

[[[['black', 'cyan'],

'white',

['green', 'red']],

[['magenta', 'yellow'],

'blue']]]

The textwrap module formats paragraphs of text to fit a given screen width:

>>>

>>> import textwrap

>>> doc = """The wrap() method is just like fill() except that it returns

... a list of strings instead of one big string with newlines to separate

... the wrapped lines."""

...

>>> print(textwrap.fill(doc, width=40))

The wrap() method is just like fill()

except that it returns a list of strings

instead of one big string with newlines

to separate the wrapped lines.

The locale module accesses a database of culture specific data formats. The grouping attribute of
locale’s format function provides a direct way of formatting numbers with group separators:

>>>

>>> import locale

>>> locale.setlocale(locale.LC_ALL, 'English_United States.1252')

'English_United States.1252'

>>> conv = locale.localeconv() # get a mapping of conventions

>>> x = 1234567.8

>>> locale.format_string("%d", x, grouping=True)

'1,234,567'

>>> locale.format_string("%s%.*f", (conv['currency_symbol'],

... conv['frac_digits'], x), grouping=True)

'$1,234,567.80'

11.2. Templating

The string module includes a versatile Template class with a simplified syntax suitable for editing by
end-users. This allows users to customize their applications without having to alter the application.

The format uses placeholder names formed by $ with valid Python identifiers (alphanumeric
characters and underscores). Surrounding the placeholder with braces allows it to be followed by
more alphanumeric letters with no intervening spaces. Writing $$ creates a single escaped $:

>>>

>>> from string import Template

>>> t = Template('${village}folk send $$10 to $cause.')

>>> t.substitute(village='Nottingham', cause='the ditch fund')

'Nottinghamfolk send $10 to the ditch fund.'

The substitute() method raises a KeyError when a placeholder is not supplied in a dictionary or a
keyword argument. For mail-merge style applications, user supplied data may be incomplete and
the safe_substitute() method may be more appropriate — it will leave placeholders unchanged if
data is missing:

>>>

>>> t = Template('Return the $item to $owner.')

>>> d = dict(item='unladen swallow')

>>> t.substitute(d)

Traceback (most recent call last):

...

KeyError: 'owner'

>>> t.safe_substitute(d)

'Return the unladen swallow to $owner.'

Template subclasses can specify a custom delimiter. For example, a batch renaming utility for a photo
browser may elect to use percent signs for placeholders such as the current date, image sequence
number, or file format:

>>>

>>> import time, os.path

>>> photofiles = ['img_1074.jpg', 'img_1076.jpg', 'img_1077.jpg']

>>> class BatchRename(Template):

... delimiter = '%'

...

>>> fmt = input('Enter rename style (%d-date %n-seqnum %f-format): ')

Enter rename style (%d-date %n-seqnum %f-format): Ashley_%n%f

>>> t = BatchRename(fmt)

>>> date = time.strftime('%d%b%y')

>>> for i, filename in enumerate(photofiles):

... base, ext = os.path.splitext(filename)

... newname = t.substitute(d=date, n=i, f=ext)

... print('{0} --> {1}'.format(filename, newname))

img_1074.jpg --> Ashley_0.jpg

img_1076.jpg --> Ashley_1.jpg

img_1077.jpg --> Ashley_2.jpg

Another application for templating is separating program logic from the details of multiple output
formats. This makes it possible to substitute custom templates for XML files, plain text reports, and
HTML web reports.

11.3. Working with Binary Data Record Layouts

The struct module provides pack() and unpack() functions for working with variable length binary
record formats. The following example shows how to loop through header information in a ZIP file
without using the zipfile module. Pack codes "H" and "I" represent two and four byte unsigned
numbers respectively. The "<" indicates that they are standard size and in little-endian byte order:

import struct

with open('myfile.zip', 'rb') as f:

data = f.read()

start = 0

for i in range(3): # show the first 3 file headers

start += 14

fields = struct.unpack('<IIIHH', data[start:start+16])

crc32, comp_size, uncomp_size, filenamesize, extra_size = fields

start += 16

filename = data[start:start+filenamesize]

start += filenamesize

extra = data[start:start+extra_size]

print(filename, hex(crc32), comp_size, uncomp_size)

start += extra_size + comp_size # skip to the next header

11.4. Multi-threading

Threading is a technique for decoupling tasks which are not sequentially dependent. Threads can be
used to improve the responsiveness of applications that accept user input while other tasks run in
the background. A related use case is running I/O in parallel with computations in another thread.

The following code shows how the high level threading module can run tasks in background while
the main program continues to run:

import threading, zipfile

class AsyncZip(threading.Thread):

def __init__(self, infile, outfile):

threading.Thread.__init__(self)

self.infile = infile

self.outfile = outfile

def run(self):

f = zipfile.ZipFile(self.outfile, 'w', zipfile.ZIP_DEFLATED)

f.write(self.infile)

f.close()

print('Finished background zip of:', self.infile)

background = AsyncZip('mydata.txt', 'myarchive.zip')

background.start()

print('The main program continues to run in foreground.')

background.join() # Wait for the background task to finish

print('Main program waited until background was done.')

The principal challenge of multi-threaded applications is coordinating threads that share data or
other resources. To that end, the threading module provides a number of synchronization primitives
including locks, events, condition variables, and semaphores.

While those tools are powerful, minor design errors can result in problems that are difficult to
reproduce. So, the preferred approach to task coordination is to concentrate all access to a resource
in a single thread and then use the queue module to feed that thread with requests from other
threads. Applications using Queue objects for inter-thread communication and coordination are
easier to design, more readable, and more reliable.

11.5. Logging

The logging module offers a full featured and flexible logging system. At its simplest, log messages
are sent to a file or to sys.stderr:

import logging

logging.debug('Debugging information')

logging.info('Informational message')
logging.warning('Warning:config file %s not found', 'server.conf')

logging.error('Error occurred')

logging.critical('Critical error -- shutting down')

This produces the following output:

WARNING:root:Warning:config file server.conf not found

ERROR:root:Error occurred

CRITICAL:root:Critical error -- shutting down

By default, informational and debugging messages are suppressed and the output is sent to standard
error. Other output options include routing messages through email, datagrams, sockets, or to an
HTTP Server. New filters can select different routing based on message
priority: DEBUG, INFO, WARNING, ERROR, and CRITICAL.

The logging system can be configured directly from Python or can be loaded from a user editable
configuration file for customized logging without altering the application.

11.6. Weak References

Python does automatic memory management (reference counting for most objects and garbage
collection to eliminate cycles). The memory is freed shortly after the last reference to it has been
eliminated.

This approach works fine for most applications but occasionally there is a need to track objects only
as long as they are being used by something else. Unfortunately, just tracking them creates a
reference that makes them permanent. The weakref module provides tools for tracking objects
without creating a reference. When the object is no longer needed, it is automatically removed from
a weakref table and a callback is triggered for weakref objects. Typical applications include caching
objects that are expensive to create:

>>>

>>> import weakref, gc

>>> class A:

... def __init__(self, value):

... self.value = value

... def __repr__(self):

... return str(self.value)

...

>>> a = A(10) # create a reference

>>> d = weakref.WeakValueDictionary()

>>> d['primary'] = a # does not create a reference

>>> d['primary'] # fetch the object if it is still alive

10

>>> del a # remove the one reference

>>> gc.collect() # run garbage collection right away

>>> d['primary'] # entry was automatically removed

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>

d['primary'] # entry was automatically removed

File "C:/python313/lib/weakref.py", line 46, in __getitem__

o = self.data[key]()

KeyError: 'primary'

11.7. Tools for Working with Lists

Many data structure needs can be met with the built-in list type. However, sometimes there is a need
for alternative implementations with different performance trade-offs.

The array module provides an array object that is like a list that stores only homogeneous data and
stores it more compactly. The following example shows an array of numbers stored as two byte
unsigned binary numbers (typecode "H") rather than the usual 16 bytes per entry for regular lists of
Python int objects:

>>>

>>> from array import array

>>> a = array('H', [4000, 10, 700, 22222])

>>> sum(a)

26932

>>> a[1:3]

array('H', [10, 700])

The collections module provides a deque object that is like a list with faster appends and pops from
the left side but slower lookups in the middle. These objects are well suited for implementing queues
and breadth first tree searches:

>>>

>>> from collections import deque

>>> d = deque(["task1", "task2", "task3"])

>>> d.append("task4")

>>> print("Handling", d.popleft())

Handling task1

unsearched = deque([starting_node])

def breadth_first_search(unsearched):

node = unsearched.popleft()

for m in gen_moves(node):

if is_goal(m):

return m

unsearched.append(m)

In addition to alternative list implementations, the library also offers other tools such as
the bisect module with functions for manipulating sorted lists:

>>>

>>> import bisect

>>> scores = [(100, 'perl'), (200, 'tcl'), (400, 'lua'), (500, 'python')]

>>> bisect.insort(scores, (300, 'ruby'))

>>> scores

[(100, 'perl'), (200, 'tcl'), (300, 'ruby'), (400, 'lua'), (500, 'python')]

The heapq module provides functions for implementing heaps based on regular lists. The lowest
valued entry is always kept at position zero. This is useful for applications which repeatedly access
the smallest element but do not want to run a full list sort:

>>>

>>> from heapq import heapify, heappop, heappush

>>> data = [1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 2, 4, 6, 8, 0]

>>> heapify(data) # rearrange the list into heap order

>>> heappush(data, -5) # add a new entry

>>> [heappop(data) for i in range(3)] # fetch the three smallest entries

[-5, 0, 1]

11.8. Decimal Floating-Point Arithmetic

The decimal module offers a Decimal datatype for decimal floating-point arithmetic. Compared to
the built-in float implementation of binary floating point, the class is especially helpful for

 financial applications and other uses which require exact decimal representation,

 control over precision,

 control over rounding to meet legal or regulatory requirements,

  tracking of significant decimal places, or

 applications where the user expects the results to match calculations done by hand.

For example, calculating a 5% tax on a 70 cent phone charge gives different results in decimal floating
point and binary floating point. The difference becomes significant if the results are rounded to the
nearest cent:

>>>

>>> from decimal import *

>>> round(Decimal('0.70') * Decimal('1.05'), 2)

Decimal('0.74')

>>> round(.70 * 1.05, 2)

0.73

The Decimal result keeps a trailing zero, automatically inferring four place significance from
multiplicands with two place significance. Decimal reproduces mathematics as done by hand and
avoids issues that can arise when binary floating point cannot exactly represent decimal quantities.

Exact representation enables the Decimal class to perform modulo calculations and equality tests
that are unsuitable for binary floating point:

>>>

>>> Decimal('1.00') % Decimal('.10')

Decimal('0.00')

>>> 1.00 % 0.10

0.09999999999999995

>>> sum([Decimal('0.1')]*10) == Decimal('1.0')

True

>>> 0.1 + 0.1 + 0.1 + 0.1 + 0.1 + 0.1 + 0.1 + 0.1 + 0.1 + 0.1 == 1.0

False

The decimal module provides arithmetic with as much precision as needed:

>>>

>>> getcontext().prec = 36

>>> Decimal(1) / Decimal(7)

Decimal('0.142857142857142857142857142857142857')
12. Virtual Environments and Packages

12.1. Introduction

Python applications will often use packages and modules that don’t come as part of the standard
library. Applications will sometimes need a specific version of a library, because the application may
require that a particular bug has been fixed or the application may be written using an obsolete
version of the library’s interface.

This means it may not be possible for one Python installation to meet the requirements of every
application. If application A needs version 1.0 of a particular module but application B needs version
2.0, then the requirements are in conflict and installing either version 1.0 or 2.0 will leave one
application unable to run.

The solution for this problem is to create a virtual environment, a self-contained directory tree that
contains a Python installation for a particular version of Python, plus a number of additional
packages.

Different applications can then use different virtual environments. To resolve the earlier example of
conflicting requirements, application A can have its own virtual environment with version 1.0
installed while application B has another virtual environment with version 2.0. If application B
requires a library be upgraded to version 3.0, this will not affect application A’s environment.

12.2. Creating Virtual Environments

The module used to create and manage virtual environments is called venv. venv will install the
Python version from which the command was run (as reported by the --version option). For instance,
executing the command with python3.12 will install version 3.12.

To create a virtual environment, decide upon a directory where you want to place it, and run
the venv module as a script with the directory path:

python -m venv tutorial-env

This will create the tutorial-env directory if it doesn’t exist, and also create directories inside it
containing a copy of the Python interpreter and various supporting files.

A common directory location for a virtual environment is .venv. This name keeps the directory
typically hidden in your shell and thus out of the way while giving it a name that explains why the
directory exists. It also prevents clashing with .env environment variable definition files that some
tooling supports.

Once you’ve created a virtual environment, you may activate it.

On Windows, run:

tutorial-env\Scripts\activate

On Unix or MacOS, run:

source tutorial-env/bin/activate

(This script is written for the bash shell. If you use the csh or fish shells, there are
alternate activate.csh and activate.fish scripts you should use instead.)
Activating the virtual environment will change your shell’s prompt to show what virtual environment
you’re using, and modify the environment so that running python will get you that particular version
and installation of Python. For example:

$ source ~/envs/tutorial-env/bin/activate

(tutorial-env) $ python

Python 3.5.1 (default, May 6 2016, 10:59:36)

...

>>> import sys

>>> sys.path

['', '/usr/local/lib/python35.zip', ...,

'~/envs/tutorial-env/lib/python3.5/site-packages']

>>>

To deactivate a virtual environment, type:

deactivate

into the terminal.

12.3. Managing Packages with pip

You can install, upgrade, and remove packages using a program called pip. By default pip will install
packages from the Python Package Index. You can browse the Python Package Index by going to it in
your web browser.

pip has a number of subcommands: “install”, “uninstall”, “freeze”, etc. (Consult the Installing Python
Modules guide for complete documentation for pip.)

You can install the latest version of a package by specifying a package’s name:

(tutorial-env) $ python -m pip install novas

Collecting novas

Downloading novas-3.1.1.3.tar.gz (136kB)

Installing collected packages: novas

Running setup.py install for novas

Successfully installed novas-3.1.1.3

You can also install a specific version of a package by giving the package name followed by == and the
version number:

(tutorial-env) $ python -m pip install requests==2.6.0

Collecting requests==2.6.0

Using cached requests-2.6.0-py2.py3-none-any.whl

Installing collected packages: requests

Successfully installed requests-2.6.0

If you re-run this command, pip will notice that the requested version is already installed and do
nothing. You can supply a different version number to get that version, or you can run python -
m pip install --upgrade to upgrade the package to the latest version:

(tutorial-env) $ python -m pip install --upgrade requests

Collecting requests

Installing collected packages: requests

Found existing installation: requests 2.6.0

Uninstalling requests-2.6.0:

Successfully uninstalled requests-2.6.0

Successfully installed requests-2.7.0

python -m pip uninstall followed by one or more package names will remove the packages from the
virtual environment.

python -m pip show will display information about a particular package:

(tutorial-env) $ python -m pip show requests

---

Metadata-Version: 2.0

Name: requests

Version: 2.7.0

Summary: Python HTTP for Humans.

Home-page: http://python-requests.org

Author: Kenneth Reitz

Author-email: [email protected]

License: Apache 2.0

Location: /Users/akuchling/envs/tutorial-env/lib/python3.4/site-packages

Requires:

python -m pip list will display all of the packages installed in the virtual environment:

(tutorial-env) $ python -m pip list

novas (3.1.1.3)

numpy (1.9.2)

pip (7.0.3)
requests (2.7.0)

setuptools (16.0)

python -m pip freeze will produce a similar list of the installed packages, but the output uses the
format that python -m pip install expects. A common convention is to put this list in
a requirements.txt file:

(tutorial-env) $ python -m pip freeze > requirements.txt

(tutorial-env) $ cat requirements.txt

novas==3.1.1.3

numpy==1.9.2

requests==2.7.0

The requirements.txt can then be committed to version control and shipped as part of an application.
Users can then install all the necessary packages with install -r:

(tutorial-env) $ python -m pip install -r requirements.txt

Collecting novas==3.1.1.3 (from -r requirements.txt (line 1))

...

Collecting numpy==1.9.2 (from -r requirements.txt (line 2))

...

Collecting requests==2.7.0 (from -r requirements.txt (line 3))

...

Installing collected packages: novas, numpy, requests

Running setup.py install for novas

Successfully installed novas-3.1.1.3 numpy-1.9.2 requests-2.7.0

pip has many more options. Consult the Installing Python Modules guide for complete
documentation for pip. When you’ve written a package and want to make it available on the Python
Package Index, consult the Python packaging user guide.

13. What Now?

Reading this tutorial has probably reinforced your interest in using Python — you should be eager to
apply Python to solving your real-world problems. Where should you go to learn more?

This tutorial is part of Python’s documentation set. Some other documents in the set are:

 The Python Standard Library:

You should browse through this manual, which gives complete (though terse) reference material
about types, functions, and the modules in the standard library. The standard Python distribution
includes a lot of additional code. There are modules to read Unix mailboxes, retrieve documents via
HTTP, generate random numbers, parse command-line options, compress data, and many other
tasks. Skimming through the Library Reference will give you an idea of what’s available.

 Installing Python Modules explains how to install additional modules written by other Python
users.

 The Python Language Reference: A detailed explanation of Python’s syntax and semantics.
It’s heavy reading, but is useful as a complete guide to the language itself.

More Python resources:

 https://www.python.org: The major Python web site. It contains code, documentation, and
pointers to Python-related pages around the web.

 https://docs.python.org: Fast access to Python’s documentation.

 https://pypi.org: The Python Package Index, previously also nicknamed the Cheese Shop [1],
is an index of user-created Python modules that are available for download. Once you begin
releasing code, you can register it here so that others can find it.

 https://code.activestate.com/recipes/langs/python/: The Python Cookbook is a sizable

collection of code examples, larger modules, and useful scripts. Particularly notable
contributions are collected in a book also titled Python Cookbook (O’Reilly & Associates,
ISBN 0-596-00797-3.)

 https://pyvideo.org collects links to Python-related videos from conferences and user-group

meetings.

 https://scipy.org: The Scientific Python project includes modules for fast array computations
and manipulations plus a host of packages for such things as linear algebra, Fourier
transforms, non-linear solvers, random number distributions, statistical analysis and the like.

For Python-related questions and problem reports, you can post to the
newsgroup comp.lang.python, or send them to the mailing list at [email protected]. The
newsgroup and mailing list are gatewayed, so messages posted to one will automatically be
forwarded to the other. There are hundreds of postings a day, asking (and answering) questions,
suggesting new features, and announcing new modules. Mailing list archives are available
at https://mail.python.org/pipermail/.

Before posting, be sure to check the list of Frequently Asked Questions (also called the FAQ). The FAQ
answers many of the questions that come up again and again, and may already contain the solution
for your problem.

Footnotes

[1]

“Cheese Shop” is a Monty Python’s sketch: a customer enters a cheese shop, but whatever cheese he
asks for, the clerk says it’s missing.
16. Appendix

16.1. Interactive Mode

There are two variants of the interactive REPL. The classic basic interpreter is supported on all
platforms with minimal line control capabilities.

On Windows, or Unix-like systems with curses support, a new interactive shell is used by default. This
one supports color, multiline editing, history browsing, and paste mode. To disable color,
see Controlling color for details. Function keys provide some additional functionality. F1 enters the
interactive help browser pydoc. F2 allows for browsing command-line history with neither output nor
the >>> and … prompts. F3 enters “paste mode”, which makes pasting larger blocks of code easier.
Press F3 to return to the regular prompt.

When using the new interactive shell, exit the shell by typing exit or quit. Adding call parentheses
after those commands is not required.

If the new interactive shell is not desired, it can be disabled via

the PYTHON_BASIC_REPL environment variable.

16.1.1. Error Handling

When an error occurs, the interpreter prints an error message and a stack trace. In interactive mode,
it then returns to the primary prompt; when input came from a file, it exits with a nonzero exit status
after printing the stack trace. (Exceptions handled by an except clause in a try statement are not
errors in this context.) Some errors are unconditionally fatal and cause an exit with a nonzero exit
status; this applies to internal inconsistencies and some cases of running out of memory. All error
messages are written to the standard error stream; normal output from executed commands is
written to standard output.

Typing the interrupt character (usually Control-C or Delete) to the primary or secondary prompt
cancels the input and returns to the primary prompt. [1] Typing an interrupt while a command is
executing raises the KeyboardInterrupt exception, which may be handled by a try statement.

16.1.2. Executable Python Scripts

On BSD’ish Unix systems, Python scripts can be made directly executable, like shell scripts, by putting
the line

#!/usr/bin/env python3

(assuming that the interpreter is on the user’s PATH) at the beginning of the script and giving the file
an executable mode. The #! must be the first two characters of the file. On some platforms, this first
line must end with a Unix-style line ending ('\n'), not a Windows ('\r\n') line ending. Note that the
hash, or pound, character, '#', is used to start a comment in Python.

The script can be given an executable mode, or permission, using the chmod command.

$ chmod +x myscript.py

On Windows systems, there is no notion of an “executable mode”. The Python installer automatically
associates .py files with python.exe so that a double-click on a Python file will run it as a script. The
extension can also be .pyw, in that case, the console window that normally appears is suppressed.

16.1.3. The Interactive Startup File

When you use Python interactively, it is frequently handy to have some standard commands
executed every time the interpreter is started. You can do this by setting an environment variable
named PYTHONSTARTUP to the name of a file containing your start-up commands. This is similar to
the .profile feature of the Unix shells.

This file is only read in interactive sessions, not when Python reads commands from a script, and not
when /dev/tty is given as the explicit source of commands (which otherwise behaves like an
interactive session). It is executed in the same namespace where interactive commands are
executed, so that objects that it defines or imports can be used without qualification in the
interactive session. You can also change the prompts sys.ps1 and sys.ps2 in this file.

If you want to read an additional start-up file from the current directory, you can program this in the
global start-up file using code like if os.path.isfile('.pythonrc.py'): exec(open('.pythonrc.py').read()). If
you want to use the startup file in a script, you must do this explicitly in the script:

import os

filename = os.environ.get('PYTHONSTARTUP')

if filename and os.path.isfile(filename):

with open(filename) as fobj:

startup_file = fobj.read()

exec(startup_file)

16.1.4. The Customization Modules

Python provides two hooks to let you customize it: sitecustomize and usercustomize. To see how it
works, you need first to find the location of your user site-packages directory. Start Python and run
this code:

>>>

>>> import site

>>> site.getusersitepackages()

'/home/user/.local/lib/python3.x/site-packages'

Now you can create a file named usercustomize.py in that directory and put anything you want in it.
It will affect every invocation of Python, unless it is started with the -s option to disable the
automatic import.

sitecustomize works in the same way, but is typically created by an administrator of the computer in
the global site-packages directory, and is imported before usercustomize. See the documentation of
the site module for more details.

Footnotes

[1]

A problem with the GNU Readline package may prevent this.