String length ... len(str)

[Jeff Wagner]

Can someone please explain the following to me:

str1 = "here"
str2 = "here", "we", "are"
len(str1) 4 len(str2)

3

Why is len(str1) = 4 and len(str2) = 3?

If we were to say it's because the len() functions returns the number of elements in a string, then
len(str1) should be = 1

It's a little confusing.

Thanks,
Jeff

[Bernard Delmée]

> Why is len(str1) = 4 and len(str2) = 3?

Because str1 is a string whereas str2 is a tuple.
Both are sequences whose size is returned by len().
You probably meant str2 = "here" + "we" + "are"
If you ask "type(str2)" at the python prompt, you'll
see exactly what's going on.

Cheers,

Bernard.

[Jay O'Connor]

Jeff Wagner wrote:

Can someone please explain the following to me:

str1 = "here"
str2 = "here", "we", "are"
len(str1)

4

len(str2)

3

Why is len(str1) = 4 and len(str2) = 3?

If we were to say it's because the len() functions returns the number of elements in a string, then
len(str1) should be = 1

It's a little confusing.

str2 =is a tuple of three strings, not a concatenated string. So you
are getting the number if strings in the tuple, not the number of
characters in a longer string. You have to use join to concatenate the
strings with either join() or +

str2 = "here", "we", "are"

str2 ('here', 'we', 'are') type (str2) <type 'tuple'> len (''.join (str2)) 9 str3 = "here" + "we" +"are"
str3 'hereweare' len (str3)

9

[John Roth]

"Bernard Delmée" <bd*****@advalvas.REMOVEME.be> wrote in message
news:3f**********************@feed0.news.be.easyne t.net...

Why is len(str1) = 4 and len(str2) = 3?
Because str1 is a string whereas str2 is a tuple.
Both are sequences whose size is returned by len().
You probably meant str2 = "here" + "we" + "are"
If you ask "type(str2)" at the python prompt, you'll
see exactly what's going on.

Actually, you could also have said:

str2 = "here" "we" "are"

and gotten the concatination. Python automatically
concatinates string literals that come together. That
makes it a bit easier to split a literal across lines.
Admittedly, it's not the most obvious behavior,
although I believe it's faster since it happens in the
lexer (or the parser, but anyway at compile time).

John Roth
Cheers,

Bernard.

[Jeff Wagner]

Thanks for the info, it clears up a lot of confusion for me.

I was under the impression that:
str1 = "here" + "we" + "are" was the same as
str2 = "here" , "we" , "are" ...

the only difference being that the str2 was separated by a space. But str1 is a string, str2 is a
tuple. Cool ... who ever came up with the word tuple? That's a weird name.

I think this clears up a few other things I had questions with, too.

Thanks a lot,
Jeff

[Erik Max Francis]

Jeff Wagner wrote:

Thanks for the info, it clears up a lot of confusion for me.

I was under the impression that:
str1 = "here" + "we" + "are" was the same as
str2 = "here" , "we" , "are" ...

the only difference being that the str2 was separated by a space. But
str1 is a string, str2 is a
tuple.
Right. What probably confused you is that print acts like this:

print "one", "two", "three"

one two three

But this is only because print is a statement, and uses this as a
special form.
Cool ... who ever came up with the word tuple? That's a weird name.

It's derived from mathematics. A pair of items is a double, three items
is a triple, four is a quadruple, and n is an n-tuple.

--
Erik Max Francis && ma*@alcyone.com && http://www.alcyone.com/max/
__ San Jose, CA, USA && 37 20 N 121 53 W && &tSftDotIotE
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\__/ Can I be your friend / 'Till the end
-- India Arie

[JanC]

Jeff Wagner <JW*****@hotmail.com> schreef:

Cool ... who ever came up with the word tuple? That's a weird name.

I'm not sure but it may come from words like "quintuple"...

--
JanC

"Be strict when sending and tolerant when receiving."
RFC 1958 - Architectural Principles of the Internet - section 3.9

[Dennis Lee Bieber]

JanC fed this fish to the penguins on Wednesday 03 December 2003 20:44
pm:

Jeff Wagner <JW*****@hotmail.com> schreef:

Cool ... who ever came up with the word tuple? That's a weird name.
I'm not sure but it may come from words like "quintuple"...

And is heavily used in formal relational database theory where it
equates to what most would call a "row" or even "record".

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