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If you took a Python course these somewhat niche methods might have escaped the curriculum. Or if you’re switching to Python from another language you might not have heard of these unique approaches even as a seasoned programmer.

Here is a webpage of Python finesse in 100 points that are guaranteed to step up your Python game at least in some way and expand your creative horizons.

These Python tricks are aimed at a programmer audience at varying levels. Here are some ideas who might benefit from the list:

<ul><li>If you took a Python 3 course lately </li><li>If you recently learned Python </li><li>If you are still learning Python and got the basics under control </li><li>If you are an experienced programmer but switching to Python for the first time </li><li>If you are curious about some interesting and unique ways you can code in Python </li><li>If you are an advanced user but still suspecting you might benefit from some tricks you might have missed </li> </ul>

Feel free to digest in chunks, combine with your #100dayPython routine, make a quick skim, make it a quarantine goal (this article is written in 2020) or completely have it your way.

Here are 100 Python Tips and Tricks:

If you are dedicated to learning Python and creating great things in the future with it. This list will offer you a great push to cover some of the topics that can go unnoticed or not be included in the conventional Python lessons.

The list includes a few well known Python concepts as well as lots of lesser known tricks and even touches on computer science a little bit in the next session.

We hope you enjoy the full list and if you have time share the love on social media.

Let’s start with beginner Python tips!

Okay, technically not singing but can you believe printing \a creates a Windows chime?

This is because \a is reserved to warning notification sound in Windows and printing it in Python triggers it.

You can check out this post to see an <a dir="ltr" href="https://holypython.com/5-ways-to-create-an-alarm-in-python/">alarm clock made by Python’s print function </a>only.

2) Dictionary Merge: ( Python Syntax Show Off  )

Here is a fantastic Python approach. Do you have 2 dictionaries that you’d like to merge easily? You can use **  notation for **kwargs-like objects (values with names like dictionaries) to merge them conveninently.

Let’s say you have 2 Olympics results from 2 separate countries that held the events. Dictionary 1 named: China_olympics and then Japan_olympics and you’d like to make a shallow merge. All you have to do is:

{**China_olympics, **Japan_olympics}

Python will take care of the rest, making it a breeze.

3) Proper File Paths: ( Handling Paths  )

r ''

This one is a life saver. standing for raw string, r in front of the string quotes ensure that file paths don’t get confused between Python and system settings.

Whenever you’re typing paths in your code, just by including that r in front of the quotes you can avoid lots of errors that might occur due to conflicts and confusions regarding path symbols like: /, //,  \. This problem occurs more often than you’d imagine and it can be very frustrating to troubleshoot. Just use r  in front and path problems no more!

Also, in some cases you might need to use double back slashes instead of forward slashes. This is because different systems use different path structures. When working with a script that communicates with Windows OS for example, you’ll need to use “\\ “

4) Big Number Readability: ( Millions and Billions  )

you can separate zeros with underscore (_)

This one is a potential favorite for teachers, scientists, finance quants, accountants, quantum physicists, actuaries, traders and all the rest of the big number people.

Underscore _  can be used to separate zeros in Python and this will make big numbers more readable while mathematically it won’t affect the syntax so you can still carry out arithmetic operations as normal:

This makes big numbers way more readable when needed.

5) Let the code draw: ( Python Turtle Drawing  )

turtle

it’s worth mentioning in case you might have missed it. Turtle is a drawing library that works with Python codes. Creating patterns with turtle can be super intuitive in learning Python.

We have some extensive tutorials that are guaranteed to step up your Python skills especially regarding programming fundamentals. Here are a couple of articles to check:

Split function is a must know from the early on. Whether it’s data science or website development or database applications or just simple Python practicing, split function is one powerful function and it makes working with strings so much easier.

14) When the code is too fast: ( Make Python Sleep  )

Sometimes you want your code to execute slowly. You might want to demonstrate something or there might be steps that require little breaks. sleep method of time library is perfect for that.

Make secs any integer representing seconds:

16) Reverse data: ( Reversed Function & Reverse Method  )

Reversed function and reverse method can only be used to reverse objects in Python. But there is a major difference between the two:

<ul><li>reversed function can reverse and iterable object and returns a reversed object as data type. </li><li>reverse method can only be used with lists as its a list method only. </li> </ul>

This one is self explanatory but still good to be aware of:

6- <code dir="ltr">#%% </code>Creating Code Sections in your IDE (Spyder)

Are you coding in Spyder? Use this command to create subsections in your code and you can run each section with Ctrl+Enter.

This trick almost converts your Spyder IDE to a Notebook, very cool trick for practicing, experimenting and learning or teaching purposes.

If you’d like to install Spyder  a free open source Python IDE that we recommend, it comes with Anaconda click here to see <a dir="ltr" href="https://holypython.com/python-setup" rel="noopener">how to install Anaconda </a>.

Most straightforward approach to removing duplicates in a list is probably using the set() function.

Set in Python is a datatype that’s sort of between lists and dictionaries.

It takes unique values only, it’s mutable and like dictionaries it’s unordered. Here is an example:

The new object will have a “set” type.

If you want to overcome the type conversion and keep your data as a list just add a list function as below and it will stay as a list after set function removes all the duplicates:

20) Python Working Directory: ( os.getcwd()  )

2- This one is so helpful when needed. Sometimes you may need to identify or double check where your Python is working (directory wise)

get working directory with getcwd() method of os library:

This information can be important sometimes when you’re coding and dealing with data and/or files etc.

For instance: you can use only file names to work with files in your working directory instead of their full file path names.

20) Python Working Directory: ( os.chdir()  )

So what if you’re not happy with the current working directory?  Don’t worry, you can use the same Python library named os  to change the working directory.

change working directory with chdir() method of os library:

ps(don’t forget to use r letter in front of your path to avoid path notion conflicts.)

22) Printing libraries: ( To get their directiories  )

Have you ever tried printing a library name directly in Python? What will happen is, it will tell you the location where library file is located. Pretty cool and such a Python feature.

23) Membership Operators: ( in & not in  )

Makes it very convenient to find out if a subgroup exists in a data object

example with in

example with not in

Do you want to print multiple values with a user-defined separater? You can use print’s sep parameter for that.

Python’s print function has a \n  new line character at the end by default.

But, sometimes, you just don’t want it to enter a new line after print or better yet you might want to add a different character to the end of each print function.

end=  parameter is perfect for that. Here is an example:

26) Triple quotes: ( Multiline Strings  )

”’some text here”’

Triple quotes are a solution to a common complication when working with strings.

Python will let you create multi-line strings as long as you use triple quotation marks, it works with both single quotes and  double quotes as long as you use 3 of them.

List comprehension is a very cool way to build lists in 1 line.

You can include conditional statements, lambda, functions, loops all in 1 line of list comprehension code. No wonder why it’s praised so much.

100 Python Tips & Tricks - HolyPython.com

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