syntaxError: 'continue' not properly in loop - python

I have been struggling with this error for a while now and there seems to be different opinions regarding why the interpreter complains about the 'continue'. So I would like to provide the erroneous code below.
import tweepy
import time
def writeHandlesToFile():
file = open("dataFile.txt","w")
try:
list = tweepy.Cursor(tweepy.api.followers,screen_name='someHandle',).items(100000)
print "cursor executed"
for item in list:
file.write(item.screen_name+"\n")
except tweepy.error.TweepError as e:
print "In the except method"
print e
time.sleep(3600)
continue
The reason I am particular on including the continue at the end is because I would like for the program to restart execution at the top from where it left off after the sleep in order to preserve the program state. I need the sleep in order to abide by the twitter api rate limits wherein the api only allows you to make a certain number of requests every hour.
So anyone who might see my mistake naive or otherwise please do point it out or please provide me with an alternative implementation without the use of the continue statement.
BTW I do not have tabs and spaces mixed as was suggested in another post.
Thank you for your help in advance.

continue is only allowed within a for or while loop. You can easily restructure your function to loop until a valid request.
def writeHandlesToFile():
while True:
with open("dataFile.txt","w") as f:
try:
lst = tweepy.Cursor(tweepy.api.followers,screen_name='someHandle',).items(100000)
print "cursor executed"
for item in lst:
f.write(item.screen_name+"\n")
break
except tweepy.error.TweepError as e:
print "In the except method"
print e
time.sleep(3600)

The problem might be in the way you are using continue
continue may only occur syntactically nested in a for or while loop,
but not nested in a function or class definition or finally statement
within that loop.6.1It continues with the next cycle of the nearest
enclosing loop.

Related

Continue the loop after an exception used in python

I am trying to run a loop with try and exception in python. Initially it runs for p=0 and j=1,2 then falls into the exception. the problem is that then I would like the loop to continue for p=1 and j=1,2,2....can you help me thanks! I tried something like this but it's not working
for p in range(1):
for j in range(23):
try:
b = response_json[0]['countries'][p]['names'][j]['values']
except:
break
Overall, using exceptions to handle normal flow is a bad pattern. Exceptions are for, well, exceptions.
Looks like you are trying to iterate over an array with missing keys. Instead of trying each key, you could iterate over the collection directly
country_data = response_json[0]['countries']
for country in country_data:
for name in country['names']:
b = name['values']
Replace break with continue (or pass).
break jumps to the end of the loop, continue jumps back to the start to continue with the next iteration. pass is a no-op used when a block is empty.

How can I end a 'try' loop in 'while' loop?

I'm in trouble about how to end a 'try' loop, which is occurred since I have the 'try', here is the code:
import time
class exe_loc:
mem = ''
lib = ''
main = ''
def wizard():
while True:
try:
temp_me = input('Please specify the full directory of the memory, usually it will be a folder called "mem"> ' )
if temp_me is True:
exe_loc.mem = temp_me
time.sleep(1)
else:
print('Error value! Please run this configurator again!')
sys.exit()
temp_lib = input('Please specify the full directory of the library, usually it will be a folder called "lib"> ')
if temp_lib is True:
exe_loc.lib = temp_lib
time.sleep(1)
else:
print('Invalid value! Please run this configurator again!')
sys.exit()
temp_main = input('Please specify the full main executable directory, usually it will be app main directory> ')
if temp_main is True:
exe_loc.main = temp_main
time.sleep(1)
I tried end it by using break, pass, and I even leaves it empty what I get is Unexpected EOF while parsing, I searched online and they said it is caused when the code blocks were not completed. Please show me if any of my code is wrong, thanks.
Btw, I'm using python 3 and I don't know how to be more specific for this question, kindly ask me if you did not understand. Sorry for my poor english.
EDIT: Solved by removing the try because I'm not using it, but I still wanna know how to end a try loop properly, thanks.
Your problem isn't the break, it's the overall, high-level shape of your try clause.
A try requires either an except or a finally block. You have neither, which means your try clause is never actually complete. So python keeps looking for the next bit until it reaches EOF (End Of File), at which point it complains.
The python docs explain in more detail, but basically you need either:
try:
do_stuff_here()
finally:
do_cleanup_here() # always runs, even if the above raises an exception
or
try:
do_stuff_here()
except SomeException:
handle_exception_here() # if do_stuff_here raised a SomeException
(You can also have both the except and finally.) If you don't need either the cleanup or the exception handling, that's even easier: just get rid of the try altogether, and have the block go directly under that while True.
Finally, as a terminology thing: try is not a loop. A loop is a bit of code that gets executed multiple times -- it loops. The try gets executed once. It's a "clause," not a "loop."
You have to also 'catch' the exception with the except statement, otherwise the try has no use.
So if you do something like:
try:
# some code here
except Exception:
# What to do if specified error is encountered
This way if anywhere in your try block an exception is raised it will not break your code, but it will be catched by your except.

Why use else in try/except construct in Python?

I am learning Python and have stumbled upon a concept I can't readily digest: the optional else block within the try construct.
According to the documentation:
The try ... except statement has an optional else clause, which, when
present, must follow all except clauses. It is useful for code that
must be executed if the try clause does not raise an exception.
What I am confused about is why have the code that must be executed if the try clause does not raise an exception within the try construct -- why not simply have it follow the try/except at the same indentation level? I think it would simplify the options for exception handling. Or another way to ask would be what the code that is in the else block would do that would not be done if it were simply following the try statement, independent of it. Maybe I am missing something, do enlighten me.
This question is somewhat similar to this one but I could not find there what I am looking for.
The else block is only executed if the code in the try doesn't raise an exception; if you put the code outside of the else block, it'd happen regardless of exceptions. Also, it happens before the finally, which is generally important.
This is generally useful when you have a brief setup or verification section that may error, followed by a block where you use the resources you set up in which you don't want to hide errors. You can't put the code in the try because errors may go to except clauses when you want them to propagate. You can't put it outside of the construct, because the resources definitely aren't available there, either because setup failed or because the finally tore everything down. Thus, you have an else block.
One use case can be to prevent users from defining a flag variable to check whether any exception was raised or not(as we do in for-else loop).
A simple example:
lis = range(100)
ind = 50
try:
lis[ind]
except:
pass
else:
#Run this statement only if the exception was not raised
print "The index was okay:",ind
ind = 101
try:
lis[ind]
except:
pass
print "The index was okay:",ind # this gets executes regardless of the exception
# This one is similar to the first example, but a `flag` variable
# is required to check whether the exception was raised or not.
ind = 10
try:
print lis[ind]
flag = True
except:
pass
if flag:
print "The index was okay:",ind
Output:
The index was okay: 50
The index was okay: 101
The index was okay: 10

Can't kill my python code. What's wrong?

Okay, so I'm writing a very simplistic password cracker in python that brute forces a password with alphanumeric characters. Currently this code only supports 1 character passwords and a password file with a md5 hashed password inside. It will eventually include the option to specify your own character limits (how many characters the cracker tries until it fails). Right now I cannot kill this code when I want it to die. I have included a try and except snippit, however it's not working. What did I do wrong?
Code: http://pastebin.com/MkJGmmDU
import linecache, hashlib
alphaNumeric = ["a","b","c","d","e","f","g","h","i","j","k","l","m","n","o","p","q","r","s","t","u","v","w","x","y","z","A","B","C","D","E","F","G","H","I","J","K","L","M","N","O","P","Q","R","S","T","U","V","W","X","Y","Z",1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,0]
class main:
def checker():
try:
while 1:
if hashlib.md5(alphaNumeric[num1]) == passwordHash:
print "Success! Your password is: " + str(alphaNumeric[num1])
break
except KeyboardInterrupt:
print "Keyboard Interrupt."
global num1, passwordHash, fileToCrack, numOfChars
print "What file do you want to crack?"
fileToCrack = raw_input("> ")
print "How many characters do you want to try?"
numOfChars = raw_input("> ")
print "Scanning file..."
passwordHash = linecache.getline(fileToCrack, 1)[0:32]
num1 = 0
checker()
main
The way to allow a KeyboardInterrupt to end your program is to do nothing. They work by depending on nothing catching them in an except block; when an exception bubbles all the way out of a program (or thread), it terminates.
What you have done is to trap the KeyboardInterrupts and handle them by printing a message and then continuing.
As for why the program gets stuck, there is nothing that ever causes num1 to change, so the md5 calculation is the same calculation every time. If you wanted to iterate over the symbols in alphaNumeric, then do that: for symbol in alphaNumeric: # do something with 'symbol'.
Of course, that will still only consider every possible one-character password. You're going to have to try harder than that... :)
I think you're also confused about the use of classes. Python does not require you to wrap everything inside a class. The main at the end of your program does nothing useful; your code runs because it is evaluated when the compiler tries to figure out what a main class is. This is an abuse of syntax. What you want to do is put this code in a main function, and call the function (the same way you call checker currently).
Besides printing, you need to actually exit your program when capturin KeyboardInterrupt, you're only printing a message.
This is what worked for me...
import sys
try:
....code that hangs....
except KeyboardInterrupt:
print "interupt"
sys.exit()
Well, when you use that try and except block, the error is raised when that error occurs. In your case, KeyboardInterrupt is your error here. But when KeyboardInterrupt is activated, nothing happens. This due to having nothing in the except part. You could do this after importing sys:
try:
#Your code#
except KeyboardInterrupt:
print 'Put Text Here'
sys.exit()
sys.exit() is an easy way to safely exit the program. This can be used for making programs with passwords to end the program if the password is wrong or something like that. That should fix the except part. Now to the try part:
If you have break as the end of the try part, nothing is going to happen. Why? Because break only works on loops, most people tend to do it for while loops. Let's make some examples. Here's one:
while 1:
print 'djfgerj'
break
The break statement will stop and end the loop immediately unlike its brother continue, which continues the loop. That's just extra information. Now if you have break in a something like this:
if liners == 0:
break
That's going to depend where that if statement is. If it is in a loop, it is going to stop the loop. If not, nothing is going to happen. I am assuming you made an attempt to exit the function which didn't work. It looks like the program should end, so use sys.exit() like I showed you above. Also, you should group that last piece of code (in the class) into a seperate function. I hope this helps you!

If exception retry in Python

How could I go about doing something like this
Try to do something.
If it works, great, continue with normal flow.
If it fails run a function and try again.
If it once again fails throw an exception and stop code.
I believe I would have to make use of try but I haven't quite come around yet to how to use it in this particular example.
It doesn't sound like you want to do a nested try-catch at all. Exceptions as control flow are a gnarly anti-pattern, and where you can avoid it, you should.
In this scenario, avoidance is easy. In the method that you describe, you want to be sure that a file exists before you do some operations on it. You also have a method to "correct" the path should it not. If both attempts fail, then you want to bail out.
With that into account, we would want to use os.path.isfile for this.
from os.path import isfile
def something(filepath):
# Don't mutate the parameter if you can help it.
p = filepath
if not isfile(p):
p = correct_path(p)
if not isfile(p):
raise Error("Cannot find file {} after correction to {}, aborting.".format(filepath, p))
with open(p, 'r') as f:
# Rest of file operations here
Try a nested try catch:
try:
do_something() #if this works, will skip rest and continue
except:
do_fix_function() #on error, do extra function
try:
do_something() #try again
except:
throw error() #if it fails this time, stop and throw an error
Note that if your do_fix_function() can also fail, you might want to put it inside the second try statement instead
This works for an arbitrary number of tries; I set it to two since that's what you want.
tries = 2
while True:
try:
step1()
except CatchThisException:
tries -= 1
if tries: # if tries != 0
step3()
continue # not necessary, just for clarity
else:
raise # step 4
else:
break # step 2
You can use retrying package to solve your retry attempt. Just write a block of code that keeps repeating on failure, until max retries is hit
For example:
import random
from retrying import retry
#retry
def do_something_unreliable():
if random.randint(0, 10) > 1:
raise IOError("Broken sauce, everything is hosed!!!111one")
else:
return "Awesome sauce!"
print do_something_unreliable()

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