I am given an assignment when I am supposed to define a function that returns the second element of a tuple if the first element of a tuple matches with the argument of a function.
Specifically, let's say that I have a list of student registration numbers that goes by:
particulars = (("S12345", "John"), ("S23456", "Max"), ("S34567", "Mary"))
And I have defined a function that is supposed to take in the argument of reg_num, such as "S12345", and return the name of the student in this case, "John". If the number does not match at all, I need to print "Not found" as a message. In essence, I understand that I need to sort through the larger tuple, and compare the first element [0] of each smaller tuple, then return the [1] entry of each smaller tuple. Here's what I have in mind:
def get_student_name(reg_num, particulars):
for i in records:
if reg_num == particulars[::1][0]:
return particulars[i][1]
else:
print("Not found")
I know I'm wrong, but I can't tell why. I'm not well acquainted with how to sort through a tuple. Can anyone offer some advice, especially in syntax? Thank you very much!
When you write for i in particulars, in each iteration i is an item of the collection and not an index. As such you cannot do particulars[i] (and there is no need - as you already have the item). In addition, remove the else statement so to not print for every item that doesn't match condition:
def get_student_name(reg_num, particulars):
for i in particulars:
if reg_num == i[0]:
return i[1]
print("Not found")
If you would want to iterate using indices you could do (but less nice):
for i in range(len(particulars)):
if reg_num == particulars[i][0]:
return particulars[i][1]
Another approach, provided to help learn new tricks for manipulating python data structures:
You can turn you tuple of tuples:
particulars = (("S12345", "John"), ("S23456", "Max"), ("S34567", "Mary"))
into a dictionary:
>>> pdict = dict(particulars)
>>> pdict
{'S12345': 'John', 'S23456': 'Max', 'S34567': 'Mary'}
You can look up the value by supplying the key:
>>> r = 'S23456'
>>> dict(pdict)[r]
'Max'
The function:
def get_student_name(reg, s_data):
try:
return dict(s_data)[reg]
except:
return "Not Found"
The use of try ... except will catch errors and just return Not Found in the case where the reg is not in the tuple in the first place. It will also catch of the supplied tuple is not a series of PAIRS, and thus cannot be converted the way you expect.
You can read more about exceptions: the basics and the docs to learn how to respond differently to different types of error.
for loops in python
Gilad Green already answered your question with a way to fix your code and a quick explanation on for loops.
Here are five loops that do more or less the same thing; I invite you to try them out.
particulars = (("S12345", "John"), ("S23456", "Max"), ("S34567", "Mary"))
for t in particulars:
print("{} {}".format(t[0], t[1]))
for i in range(len(particulars)):
print("{}: {} {}".format(i, particulars[i][0], particulars[i][1]))
for i, t in enumerate(particulars):
print("{}: {} {}".format(i, t[0], t[1]))
for reg_value, student_name in particulars:
print("{} {}".format(reg_value, student_name))
for i, (reg_value, student_name) in enumerate(particulars):
print("{}: {} {}".format(i, reg_value, student_name))
Using dictionaries instead of lists
Most importantly, I would like to add that using an unsorted list to store your student records is not the most efficient way.
If you sort the list and maintain it in sorted order, then you can use binary search to search for reg_num much faster than browsing the list one item at a time. Think of this: when you need to look up a word in a dictionary, do you read all words one by one, starting by "aah", "aback", "abaft", "abandon", etc.? No; first, you open the dictionary somewhere in the middle; you compare the words on that page with your word; then you open it again to another page; compare again; every time you do that, the number of candidate pages diminishes greatly, and so you can find your word among 300,000 other words in a very small time.
Instead of using a sorted list with binary search, you could use another data structure, for instance a binary search tree or a hash table.
But, wait! Python already does that very easily!
There is a data structure in python called a dictionary. See the documentation on dictionaries. This structure is perfectly adapted to most situations where you have keys associated to values. Here the key is the reg_number, and the value is the student name.
You can define a dictionary directly:
particulars = {'S12345': 'John', 'S23456': 'Max', 'S34567': 'Mary'}
Or you can convert your list of tuples to a dictionary:
particulars = (("S12345", "John"), ("S23456", "Max"), ("S34567", "Mary"))
particulars_as_dict = dict(particulars)
Then you can check if an reg_number is in the dictionary, with they keyword in; you can return the student name using square brackets or with the method get:
>>> particulars = {'S12345': 'John', 'S23456': 'Max', 'S34567': 'Mary'}
>>> 'S23456' in particulars
True
>>> 'S98765' in particulars
False
>>>
>>> particulars['S23456']
'Max'
>>> particulars.get('S23456')
'Max'
>>> particulars.get('S23456', 'not found')
'Max'
>>>
>>> particulars['S98765']
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>
KeyError: 'S98765'
>>> particulars.get('S98765')
None
>>> particulars.get('S98765', 'not found')
'not found'
Related
For my Introduction to Python assignment I created instances of classes, stored in lists. I can print or delete them by their position in the list, but really, I need to be able to query individual attributes, like filter out only the available ones, change their availability, or display the cost, of each of the objects. I'll attach some of the code:
class Vehicle():
def __init__(self,plateno,kml,dailycost,weeklycost,weekendcost): #attributes common to all vehicles
self.plateno=plateno
self.kml=kml
self.dailycost=dailycost
self.weeklycost=weeklycost
self.weekendcost=weekendcost
self.avail=True
# methods
def __str__(self):b
return "Vehicle Plate Number: {0}, km/l: {1}, daily: {2},weekly: {3}, weekend: {4}".format(self.plateno, self.kml, self.dailycost, self.weeklycost, self.weekendcost)
def __del__(self):
return "Vehicle deleted: {0}".format(self.plateno)
class Cvn(Vehicle):
def __init__(self,plateno,kml,bedno,dailycost,weeklycost,weekendcost):
Vehicle.__init__(self,plateno,kml,dailycost, weeklycost, weekendcost)
self.bedno=bedno
def __str__(self):
return "Caravan: Plate Number: {0}, km/l: {1}, number of beds: {2}, daily: {3},weekly: {4}, weekend: {5}, Available? {6}".format(self.plateno, self.kml, self.bedno, self.dailycost, self.weeklycost, self.weekendcost, self.avail)
# I N S T A N C E S
# C A R A V A N S Class:Cvn
# (self,plateno,kml,bedno,dailycost,weeklycost,weekendcost)
#------------------
#caravanheaders=["Km/l","Number of beds","Plate number","Daily cost","Weekly cost","Weekend cost"]
cvn1=[12,4,"11-D-144",50,350,200]
cvn2=[10,6,"10-D-965",50,365,285] #values as per Caravan table
cvn3=[11,4,"12-C-143",50,350,200]
cvn4=[15,2,"131-G-111",50,250,185]
cvnslist=[cvn1,cvn2,cvn3,cvn4] #this list contains 4 variables, each representing a list, as above
cvns=[] #this is going to be the list of lists
for i in cvnslist: #this loop creates a list of lists 'cvns'
cvns.append(i)
print("")
print(cvns) #the list of lists
cvninstances=[]
for i in range(len(cvns)):
cvninstances.append(Cvn(cvns[i][2],cvns[i][0],cvns[i][1],cvns[i][3],cvns[i][4],cvns[i][5]))
vehlist.append(Cvn(cvns[i][2],cvns[i][0],cvns[i][1],cvns[i][3],cvns[i][4],cvns[i][5]))
# print(cvninstances) #this shows just that there are objects, but not their attibutes
#for i in cvninstances:
# print(i)
print("")
for i in vehlist:
print("On Vehicles List: ",i)
print("")
print("Initial fleet displayed.")
print("")
#---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
most of the answers to similar questions on here are at a much more advanced level, unfortunately for me!
Indeed, I think that #sweeneyrod got the point : it also seems to me that your problem is to access an attribute of an instance, which can be done as :
instance.attribute
If this is the case, please read again : http://docs.python.org/2/tutorial/classes.html#instance-objects
Something else, this piece of code can be rewritten in a more elegant fashion :
cvninstances.append(Cvn(cvns[i][2],cvns[i][0],cvns[i][1],cvns[i][3],cvns[i][4],cvns[i][5]))
I would first reorder your cvn_i list so that arguments are in the same order as Cvn __init__ method then write it as :
cvninstances.append(Cvn(*cvns[i]))
* has the following meaning : "take all the item in cvns[i] and use them as arguments to instantiate a Cvn"
(Maybe that's too of an "advanced level" - to use your own word - but I think this is definitely a pattern that you'll have to know ;))
[Added]
Cf comments, to filter, use list comprehension :
[veh for veh in vehlist if veh.avail==True]
which can be written like this in a shorter way (cause veh.avail is intended to contain a boolean) :
[veh for veh in vehlist if veh.avail]
If you are used to database queries, this is - conceptually - very similar :)
[/Added]
You will find filter useful here:
filter(function, iterable): Construct a list from those elements of iterable for which function returns true. iterable may be either a sequence, a container which supports iteration, or an iterator. If iterable is a string or a tuple, the result also has that type; otherwise it is always a list. If function is None, the identity function is assumed, that is, all elements of iterable that are false are removed.
You a can create arbitrary functions for filtering using lambda:
matches = filter(lambda x: x.attr == val, obj_list)
This will give you a list of all object instances for which the attribute attr has the value val. If you want multiple possible values, e.g. a list of possible vals:
lambda x: x.attr in vals
You can also do this using list comprehensions, which are very common in Python:
matches = [i for i in obj_list if i.attr == val]
What's the shortest way to get first item of OrderedDict in Python 3?
My best:
list(ordered_dict.items())[0]
Quite long and ugly.
I can think of:
next(iter(ordered_dict.items())) # Fixed, thanks Ashwini
But it's not very self-describing.
Any better suggestions?
Programming Practices for Readabililty
In general, if you feel like code is not self-describing, the usual solution is to factor it out into a well-named function:
def first(s):
'''Return the first element from an ordered collection
or an arbitrary element from an unordered collection.
Raise StopIteration if the collection is empty.
'''
return next(iter(s))
With that helper function, the subsequent code becomes very readable:
>>> extension = {'xml', 'html', 'css', 'php', 'xhmtl'}
>>> one_extension = first(extension)
Patterns for Extracting a Single Value from Collection
The usual ways to get an element from a set, dict, OrderedDict, generator, or other non-indexable collection are:
for value in some_collection:
break
and:
value = next(iter(some_collection))
The latter is nice because the next() function lets you specify a default value if collection is empty or you can choose to let it raise an exception. The next() function is also explicit that it is asking for the next item.
Alternative Approach
If you actually need indexing and slicing and other sequence behaviors (such as indexing multiple elements), it is a simple matter to convert to a list with list(some_collection) or to use [itertools.islice()][2]:
s = list(some_collection)
print(s[0], s[1])
s = list(islice(n, some_collection))
print(s)
Use popitem(last=False), but keep in mind that it removes the entry from the dictionary, i.e. is destructive.
from collections import OrderedDict
o = OrderedDict()
o['first'] = 123
o['second'] = 234
o['third'] = 345
first_item = o.popitem(last=False)
>>> ('first', 123)
For more details, have a look at the manual on collections. It also works with Python 2.x.
Subclassing and adding a method to OrderedDict would be the answer to clarity issues:
>>> o = ExtOrderedDict(('a',1), ('b', 2))
>>> o.first_item()
('a', 1)
The implementation of ExtOrderedDict:
class ExtOrderedDict(OrderedDict):
def first_item(self):
return next(iter(self.items()))
Code that's readable, leaves the OrderedDict unchanged and doesn't needlessly generate a potentially large list just to get the first item:
for item in ordered_dict.items():
return item
If ordered_dict is empty, None would be returned implicitly.
An alternate version for use inside a stretch of code:
for first in ordered_dict.items():
break # Leave the name 'first' bound to the first item
else:
raise IndexError("Empty ordered dict")
The Python 2.x code corresponding to the first example above would need to use iteritems() instead:
for item in ordered_dict.iteritems():
return item
You might want to consider using SortedDict instead of OrderedDict.
It provides SortedDict.peekitem to peek an item.
Runtime complexity: O(log(n))
>>> sd = SortedDict({'a': 1, 'b': 2, 'c': 3})
>>> sd.peekitem(0)
('a', 1)
If you need a one-liner:
ordered_dict[[*ordered_dict.keys()][0]]
It creates a list of dict keys, picks the first and use it as key to access the dictionary value.
First record:
[key for key, value in ordered_dict][0]
Last record:
[key for key, value in ordered_dict][-1]
I have a set of input conditions that I need to compare and produce a 3rd value based on the two inputs. a list of 3 element tuples seems like a reasonable choice for this. Where I could use some help is in building an compact method for processing it. I've laid out the structure I was thinking of using as follows:
input1 (string) compares to first element, input2 (string) compares to second element, if they match, return 3rd element
('1','a', string1)
('1','b', string2)
('1','c', string3)
('1','d', string3)
('2','a', invalid)
('2','b', invalid)
('2','c', string3)
('2','d', string3)
Create a dict, dicts can have tuple as keys and store the third item as it's value.
Using a dict will provide an O(1) lookup for any pair of (input1,input2).
dic = {('1','a'): string1, ('1','b'):string2, ('1','c'): string3....}
if (input1,input2) in dic:
return dic[input1,input2]
else:
#do something else
Using a list of tuples in this case will be an O(N) approach, as for every input1,input2 you've to loop through the whole list of tuples(in worst case).
Could use a dict with a 2-tuple as key, and its value as your string/whatever and then you can keep the look to only include valid values, and have a default value of invalid if you wished... (by using dict.get)
So if you have a list of refs, you can then convert them into a dict and perform lookups as such:
refs = [
('1','a', 'string1'),
('1','b', 'string2'),
('1','c', 'string3'),
('1','d', 'string3'),
('2','a', 'invalid'),
('2','b', 'invalid'),
('2','c', 'string3'),
('2','d', 'string3')
]
lookup = {ref[:2]:ref[2] for ref in refs}
print lookup['1', 'd']
#string3
print lookup.get(('I do not', 'exist'), 'uh oh, in trouble now!')
# uh oh, in trouble now!
def checkIfSame(t):
if t[0] == t[1]:
return t[2]
I'm pretty sure this should work for you.
I have the two following lists:
# List of tuples representing the index of resources and their unique properties
# Format of (ID,Name,Prefix)
resource_types=[('0','Group','0'),('1','User','1'),('2','Filter','2'),('3','Agent','3'),('4','Asset','4'),('5','Rule','5'),('6','KBase','6'),('7','Case','7'),('8','Note','8'),('9','Report','9'),('10','ArchivedReport',':'),('11','Scheduled Task',';'),('12','Profile','<'),('13','User Shared Accessible Group','='),('14','User Accessible Group','>'),('15','Database Table Schema','?'),('16','Unassigned Resources Group','#'),('17','File','A'),('18','Snapshot','B'),('19','Data Monitor','C'),('20','Viewer Configuration','D'),('21','Instrument','E'),('22','Dashboard','F'),('23','Destination','G'),('24','Active List','H'),('25','Virtual Root','I'),('26','Vulnerability','J'),('27','Search Group','K'),('28','Pattern','L'),('29','Zone','M'),('30','Asset Range','N'),('31','Asset Category','O'),('32','Partition','P'),('33','Active Channel','Q'),('34','Stage','R'),('35','Customer','S'),('36','Field','T'),('37','Field Set','U'),('38','Scanned Report','V'),('39','Location','W'),('40','Network','X'),('41','Focused Report','Y'),('42','Escalation Level','Z'),('43','Query','['),('44','Report Template ','\\'),('45','Session List',']'),('46','Trend','^'),('47','Package','_'),('48','RESERVED','`'),('49','PROJECT_TEMPLATE','a'),('50','Attachments','b'),('51','Query Viewer','c'),('52','Use Case','d'),('53','Integration Configuration','e'),('54','Integration Command f'),('55','Integration Target','g'),('56','Actor','h'),('57','Category Model','i'),('58','Permission','j')]
# This is a list of resource ID's that we do not want to reference directly, ever.
unwanted_resource_types=[0,1,3,10,11,12,13,14,15,16,18,20,21,23,25,27,28,32,35,38,41,47,48,49,50,57,58]
I'm attempting to compare the two in order to build a third list containing the 'Name' of each unique resource type that currently exists in unwanted_resource_types. e.g. The final result list should be:
result = ['Group','User','Agent','ArchivedReport','ScheduledTask','...','...']
I've tried the following that (I thought) should work:
result = []
for res in resource_types:
if res[0] in unwanted_resource_types:
result.append(res[1])
and when that failed to populate result I also tried:
result = []
for res in resource_types:
for type in unwanted_resource_types:
if res[0] == type:
result.append(res[1])
also to no avail. Is there something i'm missing? I believe this would be the right place to perform list comprehension, but that's still in my grey basket of understanding fully (The Python docs are a bit too succinct for me in this case).
I'm also open to completely rethinking this problem, but I do need to retain the list of tuples as it's used elsewhere in the script. Thank you for any assistance you may provide.
Your resource types are using strings, and your unwanted resources are using ints, so you'll need to do some conversion to make it work.
Try this:
result = []
for res in resource_types:
if int(res[0]) in unwanted_resource_types:
result.append(res[1])
or using a list comprehension:
result = [item[1] for item in resource_types if int(item[0]) in unwanted_resource_types]
The numbers in resource_types are numbers contained within strings, whereas the numbers in unwanted_resource_types are plain numbers, so your comparison is failing. This should work:
result = []
for res in resource_types:
if int( res[0] ) in unwanted_resource_types:
result.append(res[1])
The problem is that your triples contain strings and your unwanted resources contain numbers, change the data to
resource_types=[(0,'Group','0'), ...
or use int() to convert the strings to ints before comparison, and it should work. Your result can be computed with a list comprehension as in
result=[rt[1] for rt in resource_types if int(rt[0]) in unwanted_resource_types]
If you change ('0', ...) into (0, ... you can leave out the int() call.
Additionally, you may change the unwanted_resource_types variable into a set, like
unwanted_resource_types=set([0,1,3, ... ])
to improve speed (if speed is an issue, else it's unimportant).
The one-liner:
result = map(lambda x: dict(map(lambda a: (int(a[0]), a[1]), resource_types))[x], unwanted_resource_types)
without any explicit loop does the job.
Ok - you don't want to use this in production code - but it's fun. ;-)
Comment:
The inner dict(map(lambda a: (int(a[0]), a[1]), resource_types)) creates a dictionary from the input data:
{0: 'Group', 1: 'User', 2: 'Filter', 3: 'Agent', ...
The outer map chooses the names from the dictionary.
I have a dict that has string-type keys whose exact values I can't know (because they're generated dynamically elsewhere). However, I know that that the key I want contains a particular substring, and that a single key with this substring is definitely in the dict.
What's the best, or "most pythonic" way to retrieve the value for this key?
I thought of two strategies, but both irk me:
for k,v in some_dict.items():
if 'substring' in k:
value = v
break
-- OR --
value = [v for (k,v) in some_dict.items() if 'substring' in k][0]
The first method is bulky and somewhat ugly, while the second is cleaner, but the extra step of indexing into the list comprehension (the [0]) irks me. Is there a better way to express the second version, or a more concise way to write the first?
There is an option to write the second version with the performance attributes of the first one.
Use a generator expression instead of list comprehension:
value = next(v for (k,v) in some_dict.iteritems() if 'substring' in k)
The expression inside the parenthesis will return an iterator which you will then ask to provide the next, i.e. first element. No further elements are processed.
How about this:
value = (v for (k,v) in some_dict.iteritems() if 'substring' in k).next()
It will stop immediately when it finds the first match.
But it still has O(n) complexity, where n is the number of key-value pairs. You need something like a suffix list or a suffix tree to speed up searching.
If there are many keys but the string is easy to reconstruct from the substring, then it can be faster reconstructing it. e.g. often you know the start of the key but not the datestamp that has been appended on. (so you may only have to try 365 dates rather than iterate through millions of keys for example).
It's unlikely to be the case but I thought I would suggest it anyway.
e.g.
>>> names={'bob_k':32,'james_r':443,'sarah_p':12}
>>> firstname='james' #you know the substring james because you have a list of firstnames
>>> for c in "abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz":
... name="%s_%s"%(firstname,c)
... if name in names:
... print name
...
james_r
class MyDict(dict):
def __init__(self, *kwargs):
dict.__init__(self, *kwargs)
def __getitem__(self,x):
return next(v for (k,v) in self.iteritems() if x in k)
# Defining several dicos ----------------------------------------------------
some_dict = {'abc4589':4578,'abc7812':798,'kjuy45763':1002}
another_dict = {'boumboum14':'WSZE x478',
'tagada4783':'ocean11',
'maracuna102455':None}
still_another = {12:'jfg',45:'klsjgf'}
# Selecting the dicos whose __getitem__ method will be changed -------------
name,obj = None,None
selected_dicos = [ (name,obj) for (name,obj) in globals().iteritems()
if type(obj)==dict
and all(type(x)==str for x in obj.iterkeys())]
print 'names of selected_dicos ==',[ name for (name,obj) in selected_dicos]
# Transforming the selected dicos in instances of class MyDict -----------
for k,v in selected_dicos:
globals()[k] = MyDict(v)
# Exemple of getting a value ---------------------------------------------
print "some_dict['7812'] ==",some_dict['7812']
result
names of selected_dicos == ['another_dict', 'some_dict']
some_dict['7812'] == 798
I prefer the first version, although I'd use some_dict.iteritems() (if you're on Python 2) because then you don't have to build an entire list of all the items beforehand. Instead you iterate through the dict and break as soon as you're done.
On Python 3, some_dict.items(2) already results in a dictionary view, so that's already a suitable iterator.