How to parse a list of decimal numbers in python...

[Lura]

In an effort to learn how to work with information in files, I am writing a program that opens an already existing file containing decimal numbers. It then takes the decimals, sorts them, and returns median and mean.

Here's what I have so far:

#opening file as a read only file
f = open('testfile', 'r') 
 
#assigns variable to string
numbers = f.read(testfile) 
 
#Make a list where each decimal is its own string 
 
numbers.split(",")
 

So...I have the list part accomplished. string.split(sep) yields the information as a list. But I don't know how to take these data from the list and make each decimal number it's own string.

I am still a bit new to python, so maybe I am going about this the wrong way...or maybe it's obvious?

[Glenton]

Hi. You're doing it right so far.

You need to convert the string to a float, with the float command. This can be done by looping over the string, or more efficiently with a so-called comprehension.

Hopefully the following interactive session will help you:

In [15]: num=["1","2","3.45"]
 
In [16]: type(num[0])
Out[16]: <type 'str'>
 
In [17]: num2=[float(item) for item in num]
 
In [18]: num2
Out[18]: [1.0, 2.0, 3.4500000000000002]
 
In [19]: type(num2)
Out[19]: <type 'list'>
 
In [20]: type(num2[0])
Out[20]: <type 'float'>
 

Post back to let us know how it goes.