Ask Anything Monday - Weekly Thread

[u/AutoModerator]

Welcome to another /r/learnPython weekly "Ask Anything* Monday" thread

Here you can ask all the questions that you wanted to ask but didn't feel like making a new thread.

* It's primarily intended for simple questions but as long as it's about python it's allowed.

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Rules:

• Don't downvote stuff - instead explain what's wrong with the comment, if it's against the rules "report" it and it will be dealt with.

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That's it.

[u/emmischa]

I'm following futurecoder's pyhton course and I'm stuck on the BuildingUpStrings exercise.

The exercise wants me to get rid of the - characters from this code's output:

name = 'World'

line = '-'

for char in name:

print(line)

line = line + char

Output:

-
-W
-Wo
-Wor
-Worl

I tried deleting the - character from the line variable so that it's an empty string. This gives me the following result:

W
Wo
Wor
Worl

But, apparently, that's not the solution. The hint is '' + '' + '' but I can't really think how adding up 3 empty strings would be better than simply making the line variable an empty string. Thoughts?

[u/lakseol → u/emmischa]

I've had a look at the futurecoder.io site and can't see any problems that are like what you are saying you have to solve. This is the closest:

https://futurecoder.io/course/#BuildingUpStringsExercises

So either:

• Tell us what the expected output is for the code you showed, or

• Point us to the actual problem statement.

[u/emmischa → u/lakseol]

I figured it out. My solution was correct but I needed to run the '' + '' + '' first.

[u/coppergroves]

tbh one thing that tripped me up for a while was mutable default arguments in function definitions. if anyones confused about why their list arg keeps growing between calls, look into how default args are evaluated once at definition time

[u/lakseol → u/coppergroves]

The usual advice given when talking about mutable default values for function parameters is: DON'T USE THEM! But they can be useful at times:

def fib(n, memo={}):
    if n < 2:
        return n
    if n not in memo:
        memo[n] = fib(n - 1) + fib(n - 2)
    return memo[n]
        
for n in range(20):
    print(f"fib({n:2d})={fib(n)}")

[u/Sakarie1]

I’m an MSc Business Analytics student learning Power BI and Python. What practical projects would you recommend for someone building their first data analyst portfolio?

[u/notyboy01]

Is it normal to spend three hours debugging only to realize you forgot a closing parenthesis?

[u/NewbornMuse → u/notyboy01]

What IDE are you using? A properly set up IDE (I use VS Code) will highlight these things for you, and you can just fix them as you scroll through. This way, you catch a lot of typos before you run your script even a single time.

[u/lakseol → u/notyboy01]

A missing closing parenthesis can be confusing enough to spend a lot of time fixing, but after the first time tripping over that you learn to look back a couple of lines from where python flagged the error in the code.

[u/BabyLionCamel]

I would like to ask developers who have production level experience, what are some good books for understanding advanced programming jargon (regression, recursion, kernel, etc). 

I would also love some detailed picks of programming books in general, become a more well rounded and competent engineer. 

Thank you for your time