Assigning to lists with arbitrary names

[Cliff Wells]

On Wednesday 10 October 2001 09:55, Daniel Dittmar wrote:
> > Here's the problem: I want to name each list list00 to list99. I don't
> > want to do list[0] to list[99] (since each list is actually a list of
> > lists, and I'd like to avoid a list of lists of lists  :).
>
> You could use a dictionary with keys 'list00' to 'list99', but I don't
> think having a dictionary of lists of lists is that much better. Why not
> subclass UserList for each kind of list? Then you could at least
> distinguish between the different levels.

If you really _must_ have multiple variable names (IMHO a bad idea, since 
later you will have to reference all those lists and hence hardwire those 
names into your code which will make extensiblity murder - I still feel the 
dictionary method I recommended earlier is a simpler and more extensible 
solution) you could use something like:


filenames = ["text01.txt", "text02.txt", ....]  # use fnmatch or glob to get  
                                                        # the filenames in    
                                                        # real life
i = 0
for filename in filenames:
    listname = "list%02d" % i
    exec("%s = MyImporter('%s')" % (listname, filename))
    i += 1

Which will give you 100 lists with the names list00, list99, etc and a ton of 
maintenence problems.

-- 
Cliff Wells
Software Engineer
Logiplex Corporation (www.logiplex.net)
(503) 978-6726 x308
(800) 735-0555 x308