Am I correct in thinking that that Python doesn't have a direct equivalent for Perl's __END__?
print "Perl...\n";
__END__
End of code. I can put anything I want here.
One thought that occurred to me was to use a triple-quoted string. Is there a better way to achieve this in Python?
print "Python..."
"""
End of code. I can put anything I want here.
"""
The __END__ block in perl dates from a time when programmers had to work with data from the outside world and liked to keep examples of it in the program itself.
Hard to imagine I know.
It was useful for example if you had a moving target like a hardware log file with mutating messages due to firmware updates where you wanted to compare old and new versions of the line or keep notes not strictly related to the programs operations ("Code seems slow on day x of month every month") or as mentioned above a reference set of data to run the program against. Telcos are an example of an industry where this was a frequent requirement.
Lastly Python's cult like restrictiveness seems to have a real and tiresome effect on the mindset of its advocates, if your only response to a question is "Why would you want to that when you could do X?" when X is not as useful please keep quiet++.
The triple-quote form you suggested will still create a python string, whereas Perl's parser simply ignores anything after __END__. You can't write:
"""
I can put anything in here...
Anything!
"""
import os
os.system("rm -rf /")
Comments are more suitable in my opinion.
#__END__
#Whatever I write here will be ignored
#Woohoo !
What you're asking for does not exist.
Proof: http://www.mail-archive.com/python-list#python.org/msg156396.html
A simple solution is to escape any " as \" and do a normal multi line string -- see official docs: http://docs.python.org/tutorial/introduction.html#strings
( Also, atexit doesn't work: http://www.mail-archive.com/python-list#python.org/msg156364.html )
Hm, what about sys.exit(0) ? (assuming you do import sys above it, of course)
As to why it would useful, sometimes I sit down to do a substantial rewrite of something and want to mark my "good up to this point" place.
By using sys.exit(0) in a temporary manner, I know nothing below that point will get executed, therefore if there's a problem (e.g., server error) I know it had to be above that point.
I like it slightly better than commenting out the rest of the file, just because there are more chances to make a mistake and uncomment something (stray key press at beginning of line), and also because it seems better to insert 1 line (which will later be removed), than to modify X-many lines which will then have to be un-modified later.
But yeah, this is splitting hairs; commenting works great too... assuming your editor supports easily commenting out a region, of course; if not, sys.exit(0) all the way!
I use __END__ all the time for multiples of the reasons given. I've been doing it for so long now that I put it (usually preceded by an exit('0');), along with BEGIN {} / END{} routines, in by force-of-habit. It is a shame that Python doesn't have an equivalent, but I just comment-out the lines at the bottom: extraneous, but that's about what you get with one way to rule them all languages.
Python does not have a direct equivalent to this.
Why do you want it? It doesn't sound like a really great thing to have when there are more consistent ways like putting the text at the end as comments (that's how we include arbitrary text in Python source files. Triple quoted strings are for making multi-line strings, not for non-code-related text.)
Your editor should be able to make using many lines of comments easy for you.
This question already has answers here:
Single quotes vs. double quotes in Python [closed]
(19 answers)
Closed 9 years ago.
I have been always mixing these two notations, regarding them both as a string in Python.
What are the differences between them?
Under what circumstances can we only use one of them?
They're the same. The only time it ever matters is that you have to escape the delimiter character: "\"" vs '"'.
Personally, I usually use ' for strings that aren't "user-visible" and " for strings that are, but I'm not completely consistent with that and I don't think it's common practice.
No difference at all: they mean exactly the same thing. Yes, that's unusual for Python ;-)
Some programmers like to put one-character strings in single quotes, and longer strings in double quotes. Probably a habit carried over from C. Do what you like :-)
Ah: a lot more discussion here.
They are equal and depend on your preferences
but you can do this:
>>> print 'Double" quote inside single'
Double" quote inside single
>>> print "Single' quote inside double"
Single' quote inside double
They are the same, though I prefer to use 'single quotes'as they're easier to read
More and more we use chained function calls:
value = get_row_data(original_parameters).refine_data(leval=3).transfer_to_style_c()
It can be long. To save long line in code, which is prefered?
value = get_row_data(
original_parameters).refine_data(
leval=3).transfer_to_style_c()
or:
value = get_row_data(original_parameters)\
.refine_data(leval=3)\
.transfer_to_style_c()
I feel it good to use backslash \, and put .function to new line. This makes each function call has it own line, it's easy to read. But this sounds not preferred by many. And when code makes subtle errors, when it's hard to debug, I always start to worry it might be a space or something after the backslash (\).
To quote from the Python style guide:
Long lines can be broken over multiple lines by wrapping expressions
in parentheses. These should be used in preference to using a
backslash for line continuation. Make sure to indent the continued
line appropriately. The preferred place to break around a binary
operator is after the operator, not before it.
I tend to prefer the following, which eschews the non-recommended \ at the end of a line, thanks to an opening parenthesis:
value = (get_row_data(original_parameters)
.refine_data(level=3)
.transfer_to_style_c())
One advantage of this syntax is that each method call is on its own line.
A similar kind of \-less structure is also often useful with string literals, so that they don't go beyond the recommended 79 character per line limit:
message = ("This is a very long"
" one-line message put on many"
" source lines.")
This is a single string literal, which is created efficiently by the Python interpreter (this is much better than summing strings, which creates multiple strings in memory and copies them multiple times until the final string is obtained).
Python's code formatting is nice.
What about this option:
value = get_row_data(original_parameters,
).refine_data(leval=3,
).transfer_to_style_c()
Note that commas are redundant if there are no other parameters but I keep them to maintain consistency.
The not quoting my own preference (although see comments on your question:)) or alternatives answer to this is:
Stick to the style guidelines on any project you have already - if not stated, then keep as consistent as you can with the rest of the code base in style.
Otherwise, pick a style you like and stick with that - and let others know somehow that's how you'd appreciate chained function calls to be written if not reasonably readable on one-line (or however you wish to describe it).
This question already has answers here:
Closed 11 years ago.
Possible Duplicate:
How can I print a literal “{}” characters in python string and also use .format on it?
Basically, I want to use .format(), like this:
my_string = '{{0}:{1}}'.format('hello', 'bonjour')
And have it match:
my_string = '{hello:bonjour}' #this is a string with literal curly brackets
However, the first piece of code gives me an error.
The curly brackets are important, because I'm using Python to communicate with a piece of software via text-based commands. I have no control over what kind of formatting the fosoftware expects, so it's crucial that I sort out all the formatting on my end. It uses curly brackets around strings to ensure that spaces in the strings are interpreted as single strings, rather than multiple arguments — much like you normally do with quotation marks in file paths, for example.
I'm currently using the older method:
my_string = '{%s:%s}' % ('hello', 'bonjour')
Which certainly works, but .format() seems easier to read, and when I'm sending commands with five or more variables all in one string, then readability becomes a significant issue.
Thanks!
Here is the new style:
>>> '{{{0}:{1}}}'.format('hello', 'bonjour')
'{hello:bonjour}'
But I thinking escaping is somewhat hard to read, so I prefer to switch back to the older style to avoid escaping:
>>> '{%s:%s}' % ('hello', 'bonjour')
'{hello:bonjour}'
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Closed 9 years ago.
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According to the documentation, they're pretty much interchangeable. Is there a stylistic reason to use one over the other?
I like to use double quotes around strings that are used for interpolation or that are natural language messages, and single quotes for small symbol-like strings, but will break the rules if the strings contain quotes, or if I forget. I use triple double quotes for docstrings and raw string literals for regular expressions even if they aren't needed.
For example:
LIGHT_MESSAGES = {
'English': "There are %(number_of_lights)s lights.",
'Pirate': "Arr! Thar be %(number_of_lights)s lights."
}
def lights_message(language, number_of_lights):
"""Return a language-appropriate string reporting the light count."""
return LIGHT_MESSAGES[language] % locals()
def is_pirate(message):
"""Return True if the given message sounds piratical."""
return re.search(r"(?i)(arr|avast|yohoho)!", message) is not None
Quoting the official docs at https://docs.python.org/2.0/ref/strings.html:
In plain English: String literals can be enclosed in matching single quotes (') or double quotes (").
So there is no difference. Instead, people will tell you to choose whichever style that matches the context, and to be consistent. And I would agree - adding that it is pointless to try to come up with "conventions" for this sort of thing because you'll only end up confusing any newcomers.
I used to prefer ', especially for '''docstrings''', as I find """this creates some fluff""". Also, ' can be typed without the Shift key on my Swiss German keyboard.
I have since changed to using triple quotes for """docstrings""", to conform to PEP 257.
I'm with Will:
Double quotes for text
Single quotes for anything that behaves like an identifier
Double quoted raw string literals for regexps
Tripled double quotes for docstrings
I'll stick with that even if it means a lot of escaping.
I get the most value out of single quoted identifiers standing out because of the quotes. The rest of the practices are there just to give those single quoted identifiers some standing room.
If the string you have contains one, then you should use the other. For example, "You're able to do this", or 'He said "Hi!"'. Other than that, you should simply be as consistent as you can (within a module, within a package, within a project, within an organisation).
If your code is going to be read by people who work with C/C++ (or if you switch between those languages and Python), then using '' for single-character strings, and "" for longer strings might help ease the transition. (Likewise for following other languages where they are not interchangeable).
The Python code I've seen in the wild tends to favour " over ', but only slightly. The one exception is that """these""" are much more common than '''these''', from what I have seen.
Triple quoted comments are an interesting subtopic of this question. PEP 257 specifies triple quotes for doc strings. I did a quick check using Google Code Search and found that triple double quotes in Python are about 10x as popular as triple single quotes -- 1.3M vs 131K occurrences in the code Google indexes. So in the multi line case your code is probably going to be more familiar to people if it uses triple double quotes.
"If you're going to use apostrophes,
^
you'll definitely want to use double quotes".
^
For that simple reason, I always use double quotes on the outside. Always
Speaking of fluff, what good is streamlining your string literals with ' if you're going to have to use escape characters to represent apostrophes? Does it offend coders to read novels? I can't imagine how painful high school English class was for you!
Python uses quotes something like this:
mystringliteral1="this is a string with 'quotes'"
mystringliteral2='this is a string with "quotes"'
mystringliteral3="""this is a string with "quotes" and more 'quotes'"""
mystringliteral4='''this is a string with 'quotes' and more "quotes"'''
mystringliteral5='this is a string with \"quotes\"'
mystringliteral6='this is a string with \042quotes\042'
mystringliteral6='this is a string with \047quotes\047'
print mystringliteral1
print mystringliteral2
print mystringliteral3
print mystringliteral4
print mystringliteral5
print mystringliteral6
Which gives the following output:
this is a string with 'quotes'
this is a string with "quotes"
this is a string with "quotes" and more 'quotes'
this is a string with 'quotes' and more "quotes"
this is a string with "quotes"
this is a string with 'quotes'
I use double quotes in general, but not for any specific reason - Probably just out of habit from Java.
I guess you're also more likely to want apostrophes in an inline literal string than you are to want double quotes.
Personally I stick with one or the other. It doesn't matter. And providing your own meaning to either quote is just to confuse other people when you collaborate.
It's probably a stylistic preference more than anything. I just checked PEP 8 and didn't see any mention of single versus double quotes.
I prefer single quotes because its only one keystroke instead of two. That is, I don't have to mash the shift key to make single quote.
In Perl you want to use single quotes when you have a string which doesn't need to interpolate variables or escaped characters like \n, \t, \r, etc.
PHP makes the same distinction as Perl: content in single quotes will not be interpreted (not even \n will be converted), as opposed to double quotes which can contain variables to have their value printed out.
Python does not, I'm afraid. Technically seen, there is no $ token (or the like) to separate a name/text from a variable in Python. Both features make Python more readable, less confusing, after all. Single and double quotes can be used interchangeably in Python.
I chose to use double quotes because they are easier to see.
I just use whatever strikes my fancy at the time; it's convenient to be able to switch between the two at a whim!
Of course, when quoting quote characetrs, switching between the two might not be so whimsical after all...
Your team's taste or your project's coding guidelines.
If you are in a multilanguage environment, you might wish to encourage the use of the same type of quotes for strings that the other language uses, for instance. Else, I personally like best the look of '
None as far as I know. Although if you look at some code, " " is commonly used for strings of text (I guess ' is more common inside text than "), and ' ' appears in hashkeys and things like that.
I aim to minimize both pixels and surprise. I typically prefer ' in order to minimize pixels, but " instead if the string has an apostrophe, again to minimize pixels. For a docstring, however, I prefer """ over ''' because the latter is non-standard, uncommon, and therefore surprising. If now I have a bunch of strings where I used " per the above logic, but also one that can get away with a ', I may still use " in it to preserve consistency, only to minimize surprise.
Perhaps it helps to think of the pixel minimization philosophy in the following way. Would you rather that English characters looked like A B C or AA BB CC? The latter choice wastes 50% of the non-empty pixels.
I use double quotes because I have been doing so for years in most languages (C++, Java, VB…) except Bash, because I also use double quotes in normal text and because I'm using a (modified) non-English keyboard where both characters require the shift key.
' = "
/ = \ = \\
example :
f = open('c:\word.txt', 'r')
f = open("c:\word.txt", "r")
f = open("c:/word.txt", "r")
f = open("c:\\\word.txt", "r")
Results are the same
=>> no, they're not the same.
A single backslash will escape characters. You just happen to luck out in that example because \k and \w aren't valid escapes like \t or \n or \\ or \"
If you want to use single backslashes (and have them interpreted as such), then you need to use a "raw" string. You can do this by putting an 'r' in front of the string
im_raw = r'c:\temp.txt'
non_raw = 'c:\\temp.txt'
another_way = 'c:/temp.txt'
As far as paths in Windows are concerned, forward slashes are interpreted the same way. Clearly the string itself is different though. I wouldn't guarantee that they're handled this way on an external device though.