10 Lists

Data Structure - Lists
Adopted from Stanford Uni’s CS106ap course slides by Kylie Jue and Sonja Johnson-Yu
How can we store and organize
Today’s data in our code?
questions
1. Review 
Today’s   2. Introduction to Lists 
topics 3. Advanced Lists 
4. What’s next?
Review
Console programs
Definition
Console program
A program that solicits input from a user via
an interactive terminal (console) and does
something interesting with that input
Console program summary
● Use input(prompt) to read in information from the user.

○ Make sure to convert the data to the correct type (from the
string data type)! 
● Use print() to display information for the user.

○ Make sure to convert the data to the correct type (from the int/
float data type) 
● Use a while loop to enable multiple runs of your program.

Strings
Definition
string
A data type that represents a sequence of
characters
Characters can
be letters, digits,
Definition symbols (&, !, ~),
string
etc.
A data type that represents a sequence of
characters
String fundamentals
● String literals are any string of characters enclosed in single (‘’) or

double quotes (“”) 
● Each character in the string is associated with an index 
● Strings can be combined with the + operator in a process called

concatenation 
● Strings are immutable

Indexing and slicing
● Length
○ The length of a string is the number of characters it contains
○ We can use the Python function len() to evaluate the length of a
string
len(‘banana’) → 6
len(‘’) → 0
len(‘CS106AP rocks my socks’) → 22
Slides courtesy of Sam Redmond, CS41
What are the
correct indices?
String functions
● All follow the noun.verb() syntax we’ve seen before 
● str.isupper(), str.islower()
● str.isalpha(), str.isdigit()
● str.upper(), str.lower()
String functions
Return True or
● str.isalpha(), str.isdigit() False
● str.upper(), str.lower()
String functions
● str.upper(), str.lower() Return updated

string
String functions
● str.upper(), str.lower() Return updated

string
Remember: Original string is unchanged
because of immutability!
Type conversion
● Important note: ‘123’ is a string and 123 is an int
● In order to convert between data types, we can use built-in Python

functions: str(), int(), float()
int(‘123’) == 123
float(‘24.7’) == 24.7
str(12345) == ‘12345’
str(20.19) == ‘20.19’
Doctests
Doctests
● Python has a great testing framework called doctests

○ For each function in your program, write doctests that specify an
output for a given input
○ You can (and should) have multiple doctests per function
Doctests
● Python has a great testing framework called doctests 
● PyCharm supports doctests by allowing you to easily run them in the

editor
○ Put doctests in function header comments using `>>>`
Doctests
● PyCharm supports doctests by allowing you to easily run them in the editor
def add(a, b):
“““
>>> add(2, 4)
6
”””
...
Doctests
def add(a, b):
“““
Call the function
>>> add(2, 4)
6
and specify any
””” arguments if
...
needed.
Doctests
def add(a, b):
“““
>>> add(2, 4)
6 Put the expected
”””
...
output directly
after the test.
Testing strategies
● Write tests that cover a wide variety of use cases for your function! 
● Consider:
○ Basic use cases
○ Edge cases
Definition
edge case
Uses of your function/program that
represent extreme situations
EliminationNation.py
[demo]
Takeaways
● Common pattern: processing all characters in a string

for i in range(len(s)):
current_char = s[i]
# Use current_char
Takeaways
● Common pattern: processing all characters in a string 
● Common pattern: building up a new string

new_string = ‘’
new_string += s[i]
Takeaways

new_string = ‘’
if __________:
new_string += s[i]
Takeaways

Select only certain
characters - think
new_string = ‘’ of this as a
if __________: filter!
new_string += s[i]
Takeaways
● Common pattern: building up a new string 
● Write doctests for every function!

○ Cover a range of usage patterns for your function
○ Write them before writing the actual function code
○ Run them often as you make changes
Takeaways
● Common pattern: building up a new string 
● Write doctests for every function!

○ Cover a range of usage patterns for your function
○ Write them before writing the actual function code
○ Run them often as you make changes
How can we store and organize data in code?
Lists!
Sequences
• Sequence: an object that contains
multiple items of data
• The items are stored in sequence one after
another
• Python provides different types of
sequences, including lists and tuples
• The difference between these is that a list is
mutable and a tuple is immutable
Copyright © 2018 Pearson Education, Ltd.

What is a list? Definition
List
A data type for storing
values in a linear collection.
[1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
List
[1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
List
Use [ ] to values in a linear collection.
write a list
in code!
[1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
List
Lists contain values in a linear collection.
elements!
(separate with
commas)
[1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
[‘a’, ‘b’, ‘b’, ‘d’] List

[1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
[‘a’, ‘b’, ‘b’, ‘d’] List

[True]
[1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
[‘a’, ‘b’, ‘b’, ‘d’] List

[True]
Lists can
have 1
element!
[1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
[‘a’, ‘b’, ‘b’, ‘d’] List

[True]
[1, ‘a’, 2, ‘b’, True]
[1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
[‘a’, ‘b’, ‘b’, ‘d’] List

[True]
[1, ‘a’, 2, ‘b’, True]
Lists can contain different

types!
[1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
[‘a’, ‘b’, ‘b’, ‘d’] List

[True]
[1, ‘a’, 2, ‘b’, True]
[]
[1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
[‘a’, ‘b’, ‘b’, ‘d’] List

[True]
[1, ‘a’, 2, ‘b’, True]
[]
compare to the empty string
(‘’)!
How to inspect a list
>>> letters = [‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’]
>>> letters = [‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’]
>>> letters[0]
>>> letters = [‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’]
>>> letters[0]
‘a’
>>> letters = [‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’]
>>> letters[0]
‘a’
>>> letters[3]
>>> letters = [‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’]
>>> letters[0]
‘a’
>>> letters[3]
‘d’
>>> letters = [‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’]
>>> letters[0]
‘a’ Indexing lists is similar to

>>> letters[3] indexing strings, except with
‘d’ elements instead of
characters!
The len function
• An IndexError exception is raised if an invalid
index is used
• len function: returns the length of a sequence
such as a list
• Example: size = len(my_list)
• Returns the number of elements in the list, so the
index of last element is len(list)-1
• Can be used to prevent an IndexError exception
when iterating over a list with a loop

>>> letters = [‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’]
>>> len(letters)
4
>>> letters = [‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’]
>>> len(letters)
4 len() works for lists as well!

List Slicing
• Slice: a span of items that are taken from a
sequence
• List slicing format: list[start : end]
• Span is a list containing copies of elements from
start up to, but not including, end
• If start not specified, 0 is used for start index
• If end not specified, len(list) is used for end index
• Slicing expressions can include a step value and
negative indexes relative to end of list

>>> letters = [‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’]
>>> letters = [‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’]
>>> letters[:2]
>>> letters = [‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’]
>>> letters[:2]
[‘a’, ‘b’]
>>> letters = [‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’]
>>> letters[:2]
[‘a’, ‘b’]
>>> letters[1:]
>>> letters = [‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’]
>>> letters[:2]
[‘a’, ‘b’]
>>> letters[1:]
[‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’]

>>> letters = [‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’]
>>> letters[:2]
[‘a’, ‘b’] Slicing is similar to strings,

>>> letters[1:] too!
[‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’]
Printing lists
>>> fruits = [‘apple’, ‘banana’, ‘mango’]
Printing lists
>>> print(fruits)
Printing lists
>>> print(fruits)
[‘apple’, ‘banana’, ‘mango’]

Lists Are Mutable
• Mutable sequence: the items in the sequence
can be changed
• Lists are mutable, and so their elements can be
changed
• An expression such as
• list[1] = new_value can be used to
assign a new value to a list element
• Must use a valid index to prevent raising of an
IndexError exception

Concatenating Lists
• Concatenate: join two things together
• The + operator can be used to
concatenate two lists
– Cannot concatenate a list with another data
type, such as a number
• The += augmented assignment operator
can also be used to concatenate lists

Repetition Operator
• The * operator makes multiple copies of
a list and joins them all together.
– List * n
•

How can I make multiples copies of a list
>>> numbers = [0] * 5
>>> numbers
[0, 0, 0, 0, 0]
>>> numbers = [1, 2, 3] * 3
>>> numbers
[1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3]
How can I change what’s in a list?
>>> lst = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
>>> lst = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
>>> lst += [6, 7]

>>> lst = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
>>> lst += [6, 7]
>>> lst
>>> lst = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
>>> lst += [6, 7]
>>> lst
[1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7]
>>> lst = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
>>> lst += [6, 7]
>>> lst
[1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7]
>>> lst += 8
>>> lst = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
>>> lst += [6, 7]
>>> lst
[1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7]
>>> lst += TypeError

8
>>> lst = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
>>> lst += [6, 7]
>>> lst
[1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7]
>>> lst += 8
you can only use += for
concatenating other lists!
>>> lst = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
>>> lst = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
>>> lst.append(6)
>>> lst = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
>>> lst.append(6)
append adds a single

element to the end of a
list!
>>> lst = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
>>> lst.append(6)
>>> lst
list!
>>> lst = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
>>> lst.append(6)
>>> lst
[1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6]
list!
How can I remove something from a list?
>>> lst = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
>>> lst = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
>>> last_elem = lst.pop()

>>> lst = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
pop() removes the last

element in a list and
returns it
>>> lst = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
>>> last_elem
returns it
>>> lst = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
>>> last_elem
5
returns it
>>> lst = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
>>> last_elem
5
>>> lst
returns it
>>> lst = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
>>> last_elem
5
>>> lst
returns it
[1, 2, 3, 4]
How can I check if something’s in a list?
>>> fruits = [‘apple’, ‘banana’, ‘mango’, ‘kiwi’]
>>> ‘mango’ in fruits

>>> ‘mango’ in fruits returns True if element in

list,
else False!

True list,
else False!

True list,
>>> ‘broccoli’ in fruits else False!

True list,
False

True list,
False
>>> ‘broccoli’ not in fruits


True list,
False
you can use not with in
>>> ‘broccoli’ not in fruits
>>> ‘mango’ in fruits

returns True if element in
True list,
False
>>> ‘broccoli’ not in fruits you can use not with in

True
Finding Items in Lists with the in
Operator
• You can use the in operator to determine
whether an item is contained in a list
• General format: item in list
• Returns True if the item is in the list, or False if it is
not in the list
• Similarly you can use the not in operator to
determine whether an item is not in a list

How can I loop over a list?
>>> for fruit in fruits:



like a foreach loop over a
string!

... print(fruit) string!

... print(fruit) string!
apple
banana
mango
>>> find_min([2.3, 7.1, 10.6])
2.3
Think/Pair/Share:
# syntax reminder:  
Write a function
for elem in lst: find_min()that returns
the minimum float in a
# do something list.
Think/Pair/Share:
 
Write a function find_min() that

returns the minimum float in a list.
Making a list from a string
>>> s = ‘I am comprised of words’
>>> words = s.split()


splits string where there are
spaces

>>> words spaces

>>> words spaces
[‘I’, ‘am’, ‘comprised’, ‘of’, ‘words’]

>>> words spaces
>>> s

>>> words spaces
>>> s
‘I am comprised of words’
>>> s = ‘do,re,mi,fa,sol,la,ti’
>>> notes = s.split(‘,’)


pass in a “delimiter”, which
tells us
where to split the string

pass in a “delimiter”, which
>>> notes tells us
where to split the string

pass in a “delimiter”, which tells us
>>> notes where to split the string
[‘do’, ‘re’, ‘mi’, ‘fa’, ‘sol’, ‘la’, ‘ti’]
Making a list from a range
>>> numbers = list (range(5))
[0, 1, 2, 3, 4]
>>> numbers = list (range(1, 10, 2))
[0, 3, 4, 7, 9]
Think/Pair/Share:
 
Write words_starting_with()
Inputs:
sentence (string)
char (string)
Returns:
list of words starting with character
>>> words_starting_with('I love ice cream', 'i')

Think/Pair/Share:
['I', 'ice']
 
Write a function
# syntax reminder: words_starting_with().
lst = s.split() Inputs:
sentence (string)
char (string)
Returns:
list of words starting with
character
List Methods and Useful Built-in
Functions
• append(item): used to add items to a list –
item is appended to the end of the existing list
• index(item): used to determine where an item
is located in a list
• Returns the index of the first element in the list
containing item
• Raises ValueError exception if item not in the list

Functions (cont’d.)
• insert(index, item): used to insert
item at position index in the list
• sort(): used to sort the elements of
the list in ascending order
• remove(item): removes the first
occurrence of item in the list
• reverse(): reverses the order of the
elements in the list

Functions (cont’d.)
• del statement: removes an element from a
specific index in a list
• General format: del list[i]
• min and max functions: built-in functions that
returns the item that has the lowest or highest
value in a sequence
• The sequence is passed as an argument

Advanced Slicing
>>> lst = [‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’, ‘e’]
Advanced Slicing
>>> lst = [‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’, ‘e’]
>>> lst[::-1]
Advanced Slicing
>>> lst = [‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’, ‘e’]
>>> lst[::-1]
[‘e’, ‘d’, ‘c’, ‘b’, ‘a’]

Advanced Slicing
>>> lst = [‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’, ‘e’]
>>> lst[::-1]
[‘e’, ‘d’, ‘c’, ‘b’, ‘a’]

Think/Pair/Share:
 
What just happened? What is
going on in the [::-1]?
Advanced Slicing
>>> lst = [‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’, ‘e’]
>>> lst[::-1]
(start_index, end_index,
[‘e’, ‘d’, ‘c’, ‘b’, ‘a’] step)
Advanced Slicing
>>> lst = [‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’, ‘e’]
>>> lst[::-1]
[‘e’, ‘d’, ‘c’, ‘b’, ‘a’] step)
for i in range(4, 0, -1):

Advanced Slicing
>>> lst = [‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’, ‘e’]
>>> lst[::-1]
[‘e’, ‘d’, ‘c’, ‘b’, ‘a’] step)
>>> lst
Advanced Slicing
>>> lst = [‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’, ‘e’]
>>> lst[::-1]
[‘e’, ‘d’, ‘c’, ‘b’, ‘a’] step)
>>> lst
[‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’, ‘e’]

Advanced Slicing
>>> lst = [‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’, ‘e’]
Advanced Slicing
>>> lst = [‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’, ‘e’]
>>> lst[::2]
Advanced Slicing
>>> lst = [‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’, ‘e’]
>>> lst[::2]
Think/Pair/Share:
 
What will this return?
Advanced Slicing
>>> lst = [‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’, ‘e’]
>>> lst[::2]
[‘a’, ‘c’, ‘e’]

Advanced Slicing
>>> lst = [‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’, ‘e’]
>>> lst[::2]
[‘a’, ‘c’, ‘e’] step)
Advanced Slicing
>>> lst = [‘a’, ‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’, ‘e’]
>>> lst[::2]
[‘a’, ‘c’, ‘e’] step)
for i in range(0, 6, 2):

Copying Lists
• To make a copy of a list you must copy
each element of the list
• Two methods to do this:
• Creating a new empty list and using a for loop
to add a copy of each element from the original
list to the new list
• Creating a new empty list and concatenating the
old list to the new empty list

Copying Lists (cont’d.)

Processing Lists
• List elements can be used in calculations
• To calculate total of numeric values in a list use
loop with accumulator variable
• To average numeric values in a list:
• Calculate total of the values
• Divide total of the values by len(list)
• List can be passed as an argument to a function
• List can be returned from a function

Think/Pair/Share:
 
Get a list of grades from a user and

find the average of them by dropping
the lowest grade
Two-Dimensional Lists
• Two-dimensional list: a list that contains other
lists as its elements
• Also known as nested list
• Common to think of two-dimensional lists as having
rows and columns
• Useful for working with multiple sets of data
• To process data in a two-dimensional list need
to use two indexes
• Typically use nested loops to process

Two-Dimensional Lists (cont’d.)

Two-Dimensional Lists (cont’d.)

Think/Pair/Share:
 
Write two-dimensional array with

random numbers.
What’s next?
How do computers store and
Next Lecture’s organize data?
questions How can I give instructions to my

computer outside of a program?

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Data Structure - Lists

Today’s 2. Introduction to Lists

topics 3. Advanced Lists

● Use input(prompt) to read in information from the user.

● Use print() to display information for the user.

● Use a while loop to enable multiple runs of your program.

● String literals are any string of characters enclosed in single (‘’) or

● Each character in the string is associated with an index

● Strings can be combined with the + operator in a process called

● Strings are immutable

● All follow the noun.verb() syntax we’ve seen before

● All follow the noun.verb() syntax we’ve seen before

● All follow the noun.verb() syntax we’ve seen before

● str.upper(), str.lower() Return updated

● All follow the noun.verb() syntax we’ve seen before

● str.upper(), str.lower() Return updated

● Important note: ‘123’ is a string and 123 is an int

● In order to convert between data types, we can use built-in Python

● Python has a great testing framework called doctests

● Python has a great testing framework called doctests

● PyCharm supports doctests by allowing you to easily run them in the

● Common pattern: processing all characters in a string

● Common pattern: processing all characters in a string

● Common pattern: building up a new string

● Common pattern: processing all characters in a string

● Common pattern: building up a new string

● Common pattern: processing all characters in a string

● Common pattern: building up a new string

● Common pattern: processing all characters in a string

● Common pattern: building up a new string

● Write doctests for every function!

● Common pattern: processing all characters in a string

● Common pattern: building up a new string

● Write doctests for every function!

Copyright © 2018 Pearson Education, Ltd.

[‘a’, ‘b’, ‘b’, ‘d’] List

[‘a’, ‘b’, ‘b’, ‘d’] List

[‘a’, ‘b’, ‘b’, ‘d’] List

[‘a’, ‘b’, ‘b’, ‘d’] List

[‘a’, ‘b’, ‘b’, ‘d’] List

Lists can contain different

[‘a’, ‘b’, ‘b’, ‘d’] List

[‘a’, ‘b’, ‘b’, ‘d’] List

‘a’ Indexing lists is similar to

Copyright © 2018 Pearson Education, Ltd.

4 len() works for lists as well!

Copyright © 2018 Pearson Education, Ltd.

[‘b’, ‘c’, ‘d’]

[‘a’, ‘b’] Slicing is similar to strings,

[‘apple’, ‘banana’, ‘mango’]

Copyright © 2018 Pearson Education, Ltd.

Copyright © 2018 Pearson Education, Ltd.

Copyright © 2018 Pearson Education, Ltd.

>>> lst += [6, 7]

>>> lst += [6, 7]

>>> lst += [6, 7]

>>> lst += [6, 7]

>>> lst += [6, 7]

>>> lst += TypeError

>>> lst += [6, 7]

append adds a single

>>> last_elem = lst.pop()

>>> last_elem = lst.pop()

Today’s   2. Introduction to Lists 

topics 3. Advanced Lists 

● Each character in the string is associated with an index 

● All follow the noun.verb() syntax we’ve seen before 

● All follow the noun.verb() syntax we’ve seen before 

● All follow the noun.verb() syntax we’ve seen before 

● All follow the noun.verb() syntax we’ve seen before 

● Python has a great testing framework called doctests 

● Common pattern: processing all characters in a string 

● Common pattern: processing all characters in a string 

● Common pattern: processing all characters in a string 

● Common pattern: processing all characters in a string 

● Common pattern: building up a new string 

● Common pattern: processing all characters in a string 

● Common pattern: building up a new string 