easiest way to split a list into evenly divisble smaller lists, and assign them to variables?

[flamesrock]

Lets say I have a list containing 12, 13, 23 or however many entries.
What I want is the greatest number of lists evenly divisible by a
certain number, and for those lists to be assigned to variables.

This leads to a few problems..

If I don't know the length of the list beforehand, I can't create the
variables and hardcode them. Is it possible in python to generate free
variables without stating them explicitly in the code, and if so, how
would you get a reference to them?

Secondly, is there an easier way to chop a list up into smaller lists?

consider this code:
# my_list=[1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,
# 15,16,17,18,19,20,21,22,23,24,25]
# entry=0
# dictionary_of_lists = {}
# while len(original_list) != 0:
# new_list=[]
# for x in range(4):
# if len(original_list) > 0:
# new_list.append(files.pop(0))
# dictionary_of_lists[entry] = new_list
# entry +=1

would give us
{1:[1,2,3,4],2:[5,6,7,8],
3:[9,10,11,12],4:[13,14,15,16],
5:[17,18,19,20],6:[21,22,23,24],7:[25]}

Is there a better way? What I'd like to do is create free variables
without needing to put them in a dictionary.

If not, is it possible in other languages?

-thank in advance

[Paul Rubin]

"flamesrock" <fl********@gmail.com> writes:

Lets say I have a list containing 12, 13, 23 or however many entries.
What I want is the greatest number of lists evenly divisible by a
certain number, and for those lists to be assigned to variables.
You almost certainly don't want to do that. That's something
beginning programmers often think of doing, but it's almost always
better to use something more general, like an array.
consider this code:
# my_list=[1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,
# 15,16,17,18,19,20,21,22,23,24,25]
# entry=0
# dictionary_of_lists = {}
# while len(original_list) != 0:
Umm, what's "original_list"? Do you mean "my_list"? The rest of
your code has similar errors.
would give us
{1:[1,2,3,4],2:[5,6,7,8],
3:[9,10,11,12],4:[13,14,15,16],
5:[17,18,19,20],6:[21,22,23,24],7:[25]}

Is there a better way? What I'd like to do is create free variables
without needing to put them in a dictionary.

Your best bet is probably to create a list of lists:

sublist_length = 4 # desired length of the "inner" lists
list_of_lists = []
for i in xrange(0, len(my_list), sublist_length):
list_of_lists.append(my_list[i: i+sublist_length])

That gives list_of_lists =

[[1, 2, 3, 4], [5, 6, 7, 8], [9, 10, 11, 12],
[13, 14, 15, 16], [17, 18, 19, 20], [21, 22, 23, 24], [25]]

So you'd just use list_of_lists[0] to refer to the 1st sublist, etc.

[flamesrock]

hmmm..that makes much more sense. thanks :)

[gene tani]

http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Coo.../Recipe/303279
http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Coo.../Recipe/347689
http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Coo.../Recipe/303060

OR: collections.deque:
http://python.org/doc/2.4/lib/deque-recipes.html

flamesrock wrote:

hmmm..that makes much more sense. thanks :)