Types and expressions

Arithmetic with Different Types

Which of the following will print 2.0? Note: there may be more than one right answer.

first = 1.0
second = "1"
third = "1.1"

1. first + float(second)
2. float(second) + float(third)
3. first + int(third)
4. first + int(float(third))
5. int(first) + int(float(third))
6. 2.0 * second

Think like a computer - division

Computers cannot intuitively solve problems; the problem must be broken down by the computer into a series of logical steps. How would a computer solve the following problem?

If num_subjects is the number of subjects taking part in a study, and num_per_survey is the number that can take part in a single survey, write a series of expressions that calculates the number of surveys needed to reach everyone once.

Hint: you may need to use // and %

Test your expressions with num_subjects = 600 and num_per_survey = 20.

Now test again with num_per_survey = 42.

Conditionals - if statements

Close Enough

Write some conditions that print True if the variable a is within 10% of the variable b and False otherwise. Compare your implementation with your partner’s: do you get the same answer for all possible pairs of numbers? Try you code with:

a = 5
b = 5.1

Try it again with:

a = 7
b = 4

What other values of a and b would it be good to try your code with?

For loops

Practice Accumulating

Fill in the blanks in each of the programs below to produce the indicated result.

# Total length of the strings in the list: ["red", "green", "blue"] => 12
total = 0
for word in ["red", "green", "blue"]:
    ____ = ____ + len(word)
print(total)

# List of word lengths: ["red", "green", "blue"] => [3, 5, 4]
lengths = ____
for word in ["red", "green", "blue"]:
    lengths.____(____)
print(lengths)

# Concatenate all words: ["red", "green", "blue"] => "redgreenblue"
words = ["red", "green", "blue"]
result = ____
for ____ in ____:
    ____
print(result)

# Create acronym: ["red", "green", "blue"] => "RGB"
# write the whole thing

Cumulative Sum

Reorder and properly indent the lines of code below so that they print a list with the cumulative sum of data. The result should be [1, 3, 5, 10].

cumulative.append(my_sum)
for number in data:
cumulative = []
my_sum = my_sum + number
print(cumulative)
data = [1,2,2,5]

Computing Powers With Loops

Exponentiation is built into Python:

print(5 ** 3)

125

Write a loop that calculates the same result as 5 ** 3 using multiplication (and without exponentiation).

Reverse a String

Knowing that two strings can be concatenated using the + operator, write a loop that takes a string and produces a new string with the characters in reverse order, so 'Newton' becomes 'notweN'.

Counting Vowels

1. Write a loop that counts the number of vowels in a character string.
2. Test it on a few individual words and full sentences.
3. Once you are done, compare your solution to your neighbor’s. Did you make the same decisions about how to handle the letter ‘y’ (which some people think is a vowel, and some do not)?

Computing the Value of a Polynomial

The built-in function enumerate takes a sequence (e.g. a list) and generates a new sequence of the same length. Each element of the new sequence is a pair composed of the index (0, 1, 2,…) and the value from the original sequence:

for i, x in enumerate(xs):
    # Do something using i and x

The code above loops through xs, assigning the index to i and the value to x.

Suppose you have encoded a polynomial as a list of coefficients in the following way: the first element is the constant term, the second element is the coefficient of the linear term, the third is the coefficient of the quadratic term, etc.

x = 5
cc = [2, 4, 3]

y = cc[0] * x**0 + cc[1] * x**1 + cc[2] * x**2
y = 97

Write a loop using enumerate(cc) which computes the value y of any polynomial, given x and cc.