VARAIBLE TYPES PART 2

Standard Data Types:

 

The data stored in memory can be of many types. For example, a person's age is stored as a numeric value and his or her address is stored as alphanumeric characters. Python has various standard data types that are used to define the operations possible on them and the storage method for each of them.

Python has five standard data types −

  • Numbers
  • String
  • List
  • Tuple
  • Dictionary

Python Numbers

Number data types store numeric values. Number objects are created when you assign a value to them. For example −

var1 = 1
var2 = 10

You can also delete the reference to a number object by using the del statement. The syntax of the del statement is −

del var1[,var2[,var3[....,varN]]]]

You can delete a single object or multiple objects by using the del statement. For example −

del var
del var_a, var_b

Python supports four different numerical types −

  • int (signed integers)
  • long (long integers, they can also be represented in octal and hexadecimal)
  • float (floating point real values)
  • complex (complex numbers)

Examples

Here are some examples of numbers −

int

long

float

complex

10

51924361L

0.0

3.14j

100

-0x19323L

15.20

45.j

-786

0122L

-21.9

9.322e-36j

080

0xDEFABCECBDAECBFBAEl

32.3+e18

.876j

-0490

535633629843L

-90.

-.6545+0J

-0x260

-052318172735L

-32.54e100

3e+26J

0x69

-4721885298529L

70.2-E12

4.53e-7j

Python allows you to use a lowercase l with long, but it is recommended that you use only an uppercase L to avoid confusion with the number 1. Python displays long integers with an uppercase L.

A complex number consists of an ordered pair of real floating-point numbers denoted by x + yj, where x and y are the real numbers and j is the imaginary unit.

Python Strings:

Strings in Python are identified as a contiguous set of characters represented in the quotation marks. Python allows for either pairs of single or double quotes. Subsets of strings can be taken using the slice operator ([ ] and [:] ) with indexes starting at 0 in the beginning of the string and working their way from -1 at the end.

The plus (+) sign is the string concatenation operator and the asterisk (*) is the repetition operator. For example –

str = 'Hello World!'
 
print str          # Prints complete string
print str[0]       # Prints first character of the string
print str[2:5]     # Prints characters starting from 3rd to 5th
print str[2:]      # Prints string starting from 3rd character
print str * 2      # Prints string two times
print str + "TEST" # Prints concatenated string

 

This will produce the following outputs:

Hello World!
H
llo
llo World!
Hello World!Hello World!
Hello World!TEST

 

Python Lists:

Lists are the most versatile of Python's compound data types. A list contains items separated by commas and enclosed within square brackets ([]). To some extent, lists are similar to arrays in C. One difference between them is that all the items belonging to a list can be of different data type.

The values stored in a list can be accessed using the slice operator ([ ] and [:]) with indexes starting at 0 in the beginning of the list and working their way to end -1. The plus (+) sign is the list concatenation operator, and the asterisk (*) is the repetition operator. For example –

list = [ 'abcd', 786 , 2.23, 'john', 70.2 ]
tinylist = [123, 'john']
 
print list          # Prints complete list
print list[0]       # Prints first element of the list
print list[1:3]     # Prints elements starting from 2nd till 3rd 
print list[2:]      # Prints elements starting from 3rd element
print tinylist * 2  # Prints list two times
print list + tinylist # Prints concatenated lists

This will give the outputs:

['abcd', 786, 2.23, 'john', 70.2]
abcd
[786, 2.23]
[2.23, 'john', 70.2]
[123, 'john', 123, 'john']
['abcd', 786, 2.23, 'john', 70.2, 123, 'john']
 

Python Tuples:

A tuple is another sequence data type that is similar to the list. A tuple consists of a number of values separated by commas. Unlike lists, however, tuples are enclosed within parentheses.

The main differences between lists and tuples are: Lists are enclosed in brackets ( [ ] ) and their elements and size can be changed, while tuples are enclosed in parentheses ( ( ) ) and cannot be updated. Tuples can be thought of as read-only lists. For example –

tuple = ( 'abcd', 786 , 2.23, 'john', 70.2  )
tinytuple = (123, 'john')
 
print tuple           # Prints complete list
print tuple[0]        # Prints first element of the list
print tuple[1:3]      # Prints elements starting from 2nd till 3rd 
print tuple[2:]       # Prints elements starting from 3rd element
print tinytuple * 2   # Prints list two times
print tuple + tinytuple # Prints concatenated lists
 

 

This will give:

('abcd', 786, 2.23, 'john', 70.2)
abcd
(786, 2.23)
(2.23, 'john', 70.2)
(123, 'john', 123, 'john')
('abcd', 786, 2.23, 'john', 70.2, 123, 'john')
 

The below code is invalid with tuple,because we tried to update the values of the tuple which is not possible,the similar is possible with lists.

 
tuple = ( 'abcd', 786 , 2.23, 'john', 70.2  )
list = [ 'abcd', 786 , 2.23, 'john', 70.2  ]
tuple[2] = 1000    # Invalid syntax with tuple
list[2] = 1000     # Valid syntax with list
 

Python Dictionary:

Python's dictionaries are kind of hash table type. They work like associative arrays or hashes found in Perl and consist of key-value pairs. A dictionary key can be almost any Python type, but are usually numbers or strings. Values, on the other hand, can be any arbitrary Python object.

Dictionaries are enclosed by curly braces ({ }) and values can be assigned and accessed using square braces ([]). For example −

dict = {}
dict['one'] = "This is one"
dict[2]     = "This is two"
 
tinydict = {'name': 'john','code':6734, 'dept': 'sales'}
 
 
print dict['one']       # Prints value for 'one' key
print dict[2]           # Prints value for 2 key
print tinydict          # Prints complete dictionary
print tinydict.keys()   # Prints all the keys
print tinydict.values() # Prints all the values

Output:

This is one

This is two

{'dept': 'sales', 'code': 6734, 'name': 'john'}
['dept', 'code', 'name']
['sales', 6734, 'john']
Dictionaries have no concept of order among elements. It is incorrect to say that the elements are "out of order"; they are simply unordered.

 

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