In-place modification of Python lists - python

I am trying to perform in-place modification of a list of list on the level of the primary list. However, when I try to modify the iterating variable (row in the example below), it appears to create a new pointer to it rather than modifying it.
Smallest example of my problem.
c = [1,2,3]
for x in c:
x = x + 3
print(c) #returns [1,2,3], expected [4,5,6]
The above example is a trivial example of my problem. Is there a way to modify x elementwise, in-place and have the changes appear in C?
Less trivial example of my problem. I am switching all 0's to 1's and vice-versa.
A = [[1,1,0],
[1,0,1],
[0,0,0]]
for row in A:
row = list(map(lambda val: 1 - val, row))
print(A)
Expected
A = [[0,0,1],
[0,1,0],
[1,1,1]]
Returned
A = [[1,1,0],
[1,0,1],
[0,0,0]]
update:
Great answers so far. I am interested how the iterating variable (row in the second example) is linked to the iterable variable (A in the second example).
If I do the following, which reverses each sublist of A, it works perfectly.
Why does the following example, where I modify the iterating variable works but the above examples do not?
A = [[1,1,0],
[1,0,1],
[0,0,0]]
for row in A:
row.reverse()
print(A)
#returns, as expected
A = [[0, 1, 1],
[1, 0, 1],
[0, 0, 0]]

I found this in the docs: https://docs.python.org/3/tutorial/controlflow.html#for
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.
If you need to modify the sequence you are iterating over while inside
the loop (for example to duplicate selected items), it is recommended
that you first make a copy. Iterating over a sequence does not
implicitly make a copy.
I was wrong in my first response, when iterating through a list it returns the actual items in that list. However, it seems they cannot be edited directly while they are being iterated through. This is why iterating through the integers the length of the list works.
As for why the .reverse() function works, I think it's because it is affecting a list instead of a value. I tried to use similar built in functions on nonlist datatypes like .replace() on strings and it had no effect.
All of the other list functions I tried worked: .append(), .remove(), and .reverse() as you showed. I'm not sure why this is, but I hope it clears up what you can do in for loops a bit more.
Answer to old question below:
The way you are using the for loops doesn't affect the actual list, just the temporary variable that is iterating through the list. There are a few ways you can fix this. Instead of iterating through each element you can can count up to the length of the list and modify the list directly.
c = [1,2,3]
for n in range(len(c)):
c[n] += 3
print(c)
You can also use the enumerate() function to iterate through both a counter and list items.
c = [1,2,3]
for n, x in enumerate(c):
c[n] = x + 3
print(c)
In this case, n is a counter and x is the item in the list.
Finally, you can use list comprehension to generate a new list with desired differences in one line.
c = [1, 2, 3]
d = [x + 3 for x in c]
print(d)

The usual way to poke values into an existing list in Python is to use enumerate which lets you iterate over both the indices and the values at once -- then use the indices to manipulate the list:
c = [1,2,3]
for index, value in enumerate(c):
c[index] = value + 3
For your second example you'd do almost the same:
A = [[1,1,0],
[1,0,1],
[0,0,0]]
for row in A:
for index, val in row:
row[index] = 0 if val > 0 else 1
In the second example the list objects in A become the loop variable row -- and since you're only mutating them (not assigning to them) you don't need enumerate and the index

If you want to keep it consice without creating an additional variable, you could also do:
c = [1,2,3]
print(id(c))
c[:] = [i+3 for i in c]
print(c, id(c))
Output:
2881750110600
[4, 5, 6] 2881750110600

Using list comprehension here also will work:
A = [[1,1,0],
[1,0,1],
[0,0,0]]
A = [[0 if x > 0 else 1 for x in row] for row in A]
print(A)
Output:
[[0, 0, 1],
[0, 1, 0],
[1, 1, 1]]

Related

Recursively multiply all values in an array Python

I've had a look through the forums and can't find anything to do with multiplying all elements in an array recursively.
I've created the following code that almost does what I want. The goal is to use no loops and only recursion.
Here's the code:
def multAll(k,A):
multAllAux(k,A)
return A[:]
def multAllAux(k,A):
B = [0]
if A == []:
return 0
else:
B[0] = (A[0] * k)
B.append(multAllAux(k,A[1:]))
return B
print(multAllAux(10, [5,12,31,7,25] ))
The current output is:
[50, [120, [310, [70, [250, 0]]]]]
However, it should be:
[50,120,310,70,250]
I know I am close, but I am at a complete loss at this point. The restrictions of no loops and solely recursion has left me boggled!
Your multAllAux function returns a list. If you append a list to another list, you get this nested list kind of structure that you are getting right now.
If you instead use the "extend" function; it will work as expected.
>>> a = [1, 2, 3]
>>> a.extend([4, 5])
>>> a
[1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
extend takes the elements from a second list and adds them to the first list, instead of adding the second list itself which is what append does!
Your function also returns a zero at the end of the list, which you don't need. You can try this:
def mult(k, A: list) -> list:
return [k * A[0]] + mult(k, A[1:]) if A else []
The problem is here:
B.append(multAllAux(k,A[1:])))
What .append(..) does is it takes the argument, considers it as a single element and adds that element to the end of the list. What you want is to concatenate to the list (ie the item being added should be seen as a list of elements rather than one single element).
You can say something like: B = B + multAllAux(..) or just use +=
B += multAllAux(...)
BTW, if you wanted to multiply a single number to a list, there is a very similar construct: map(..). Note that this behaves slightly differently depending on whether you're using Py2 or Py3.
print(map(lambda x: x * 10, [5,12,31,7,25]))

How to delete current element read in list by Python?

Here is what I exactly want:
A = [1,2,3]
for a in A:
if a > 1:
del a
print(A)
I want list a to be [1], however it will still be [1,2,3].
So my real goal is to delete current element I get now.
I know there is one usage of 'del' liking this:
A = [1,2,3]
for i, a in enumerate(A):
if a > 1:
del A[i]
print(A)
and list a will be [1,3] but not [1].
Because when I use
del a[1] #2
the orginally 3 in list A will be needed to use index 1 to get it from list A rather than using 2. So I can not delete it successfully.
How can I delete the current element in the list?
It is almost never a good idea to change a collection you are iterative over. In many cases, a better way would be to select only these elements that you want in your new list.
A pythonesque way to do this is using list comprehension:
a = [1,2,3]
b = [x for x in a if x <= 1]
print (b)
the '[ .. for ... if ..]' is a very nice syntax for all kinds of list operations like map and filter.
Notice that I complemented your filter predicate, because I select what has to stay, in stead of what has to be deleted.
Hope this helps!!
B = filter(lambda x: x <= 1, A)
Then B is all elements that less than or equal 1 of A.
In general, you must be very careful while modifying the data structure if you are currently iterating over its elements. Python will give you an error if you try to delete elements from a list while iterating over the elements of the list. If you really want to modify the list, then use a different iteration strategy, e.g.
A = [1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3]
n = len(A)
i = 0
while i < n:
if A[i] > 1:
del A[i]
n -= 1
else:
i += 1
print(A)
This is one way to get the result you want.
>>> [i for i in [1,2,3] if i<=1]
[1]
>>> list(filter(lambda x:x<=1, [1,2,3]))
[1]
>>>
all list elements that are >1 are filtered out
In your Code when you are trying to delete the value
del a
You actually were trying to delete a temporary variable a whose value is same as the value of A[X] . So the value in A still remains unaffected. If you want to delete the value from A, you can make use of
del A[X]
a.remove(value)
these methods will delete/remove the value from the List .

How to traverse a list in reverse order in Python (index-style: '... in range(...)' only)

I'm new to Python so I am still getting used to looping in this language.
So, for example, I have the following code (the element type in the list is array)
my_list = [array0, array1, array2, array3]
temp = my_list[-1]
for k in range(len(my_list) - 1, 0):
temp = temp + my_list[k - 1]
return temp
I want to traverse the list from the end of the list and stop at the second element (k=1), but it looks like the for loop will never be entered and it will just return the initial temp outside the loop. I don't know why. Can someone help? Thanks.
Avoid looping with range, just iterate with a for loop as a general advice.
If you want to reverse a list, use reversed(my_list).
So in your case the solution would be:
my_list = reversed([array0,array1,array2,array3])
That gives you [array3, array2, ...]
For omitting the last array from the reversed list, use slicing:
my_list = reversed([array0,array1,array2,array3])[:-1]
So your code turns to a one liner :-)
Let's look at this part by part:
len(my_list) is 4. Thus range(len(my_list)-1, 0) is the same as range(3, 0), which is [] in Python 2. (In Python 3, try list(range(3, 0)) to see the same empty list.)
If you want a declining range, use a negative step (third argument):
range(3, 0, -1)
gives [3, 2, 1]. It doesn't include 0, because even for negative steps, the upper bound (second argument) is exclusive, i.e., not part of the result. It seems you've worked around this by initializing the temp variable with the last array in my_list already before then loop, and then subtracting 1 from the index when using it to access my_list contents in the loop.
my_list = [array0, array1, array2, array3]
temp = my_list[-1]
for k in range(len(my_list) - 1, 0, -1):
temp = temp + my_list[k - 1]
return temp
would thus probably work.
However, if you need the indices only to access my_list, you can get rid of them by directly iterating over the elements of my_list in the (here reverse) order you want:
my_list = [array0, array1, array2, array3]
temp = empty_array # Not quite sure what this has to be. (Depends on your array type.)
for array in reversed(my_list):
temp = temp + array
return temp
I'm assuming your arrays are concatenated in the loop. If it's instead an actual addition (NumPy vector addition, for example — though I don't see why the order of addition would matter for that, except maybe for precision, if the values in my_list are sorted), use an appropriate zero-element instead of empty_array.
You can even get rid of the loop completely. If you want to add your arrays:
my_list = [array0, array1, array2, array3]
return sum(reversed(my_list))
If you want to concatenate them:
from itertools import chain
my_list = [array0, array1, array2, array3]
return list(chain.from_iterable(reversed(my_list)))
You can traverse a list in reverse like so:
for i in range(len(lis), 0, -1):
print (i)
To stop at the second element edit your range() function to stop at 1:
for i in range(len(lis), 1, -1):
print (i)

List of lists based on numbers in another list

Let's say I have an array
a = np.array[5, 3, 2]
and based on that array I want to return a new array in the form:
b = np.array[ [0, 1, 2, 3, 4], [0, 1, 2], [0, 1] ]
I've been trying:
for item in a:
b = np.hstack(np.arange(item))
print b
but this only gives me the elements without joining them into an array;
for item in a:
b = b.append((b[:], b[item]))
print b
but this approach blows up nicely with a:
AttributeError: 'numpy.ndarray' object has no attribute 'append'
I have tried other things, like:
b[item] = np.arange(item),
but that one complains about out-of-bounds indices.
And
b = np.zeros(len(a))
for item in np.arange(len(a)):
b[item] = np.arange(b[item])
print b
which complains with
ValueError: setting an array element with a sequence.
That last one is the one that looks more promising and, searching for some questions on this site (https://stackoverflow.com/a/13311979/531687) I know that the problem is that I am trying to fit a sequence where a value is expected, but I can't figure out my way around it.
How can I go about this?
This should work
b = [range(x) for x in a]
update
The brackets [...] here create a list and inside an iterator can be used to define the items in the list. In this case the items of of type range(x) for each item in a.
Note that there is a difference in implementation between python2 and python3 here. In python2 this actually generates a list of lists. In python3 however this generates a lists of generators (the python2 equivalent would be xrange), which is typically more efficient.

Array Indexing in Python

Beginner here, learning python, was wondering something.
This gives me the second element:
list = [1,2,3,4]
list.index(2)
2
But when i tried this:
list = [0] * 5
list[2] = [1,2,3,4]
list.index[4]
I get an error. Is there some way to pull the index of an element from an array, no matter what list it's placed into? I know it's possible with dictionaries:
info = {first:1,second:2,third:3}
for i in info.values:
print i
1
2
3
Is there something like that for lists?
The index method does not do what you expect. To get an item at an index, you must use the [] syntax:
>>> my_list = ['foo', 'bar', 'baz']
>>> my_list[1] # indices are zero-based
'bar'
index is used to get an index from an item:
>>> my_list.index('baz')
2
If you're asking whether there's any way to get index to recurse into sub-lists, the answer is no, because it would have to return something that you could then pass into [], and [] never goes into sub-lists.
list is an inbuilt function don't use it as variable name it is against the protocol instead use lst.
To access a element from a list use [ ] with index number of that element
lst = [1,2,3,4]
lst[0]
1
one more example of same
lst = [1,2,3,4]
lst[3]
4
Use (:) semicolon to access elements in series first index number before semicolon is Included & Excluded after semicolon
lst[0:3]
[1, 2, 3]
If index number before semicolon is not specified then all the numbers is included till the start of the list with respect to index number after semicolon
lst[:2]
[1, 2]
If index number after semicolon is not specified then all the numbers is included till the end of the list with respect to index number before semicolon
lst[1:]
[2, 3, 4]
If we give one more semicolon the specifield number will be treated as steps
lst[0:4:2]
[1, 3]
This is used to find the specific index number of a element
lst.index(3)
2
This is one of my favourite the pop function it pulls out the element on the bases of index provided more over it also remove that element from the main list
lst.pop(1)
2
Now see the main list the element is removed..:)
lst
[1, 3, 4]
For extracting even numbers from a given list use this, here i am taking new example for better understanding
lst = [1,1,2,3,4,44,45,56]
import numpy as np
lst = np.array(lst)
lst = lst[lst%2==0]
list(lst)
[2, 4, 44, 56]
For extracting odd numbers from a given list use this (Note where i have assingn 1 rather than 0)
lst = [1,1,2,3,4,44,45,56]
import numpy as np
lst = np.array(lst)
lst = lst[lst%2==1]
list(lst)
[1, 1, 3, 45]
Happy Learning...:)
In your second example, your list is going to look like this:
[0, 0, [1, 2, 3, 4], 0, 0]
There's therefore no element 4 in the list.
This is because when you set list[2], you are changing the third element, not updating further elements in the list.
If you want to replace a range of values in the list, use slicing notation, for example list[2:] (for 'every element from the third to the last').
More generally, the .index method operates on identities. So the following will work, because you're asking python where the particular list object you inserted goes in the list:
lst = [0]*5
lst2 = [1,2,3,4]
lst[2] = lst2
lst.index(lst2) # 2
The answer to your question is no, but you have some other issues with your code.
First, do not use list as a variable name, because its also the name of the built-in function list.
Secondly, list.index[4] is different than list.index(4); both will give errors in your case, but they are two different operations.
If you want to pull the index of a particular element then index function will help. However, enumerate will do similar to the dictionary example,
>>> l=['first','second','third']
>>> for index,element in enumerate(l):
... print index,element
...
output
0 first
1 second
2 third

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