Variable-length arguments in Python

You may need to process a function for more arguments than you specified while defining the function. These arguments are called variable-length arguments and are not named in the function definition, unlike required and default arguments.

Syntax

Syntax for a function with non-keyword variable arguments is this −

def functionname([formal_args,] *var_args_tuple ):
"function_docstring"
function_suite
return [expression]

An asterisk (*) is placed before the variable name that holds the values of all nonkeyword variable arguments. This tuple remains empty if no additional arguments are specified during the function call.

Example

#!/usr/bin/python
# Function definition is here
def printinfo( arg1, *vartuple ):
"This prints a variable passed arguments"
print "Output is: "
print arg1
for var in vartuple:
print var
return;
# Now you can call printinfo function
printinfo( 10 )
printinfo( 70, 60, 50 )

Output

When the above code is executed, it produces the following result −

Output is:
10
Output is:
70
60
50