Struggling with basics

[Reinhold Birkenfeld]

Jason wrote:
> A week ago I posted a simple little hi-score routine that I was using to 
> learn Python.
> 
> I've only just managed to examine the code, and the responses that 
> people gave, and I'm now seriously struggling to understand why things 
> aren't working correctly.
> 
> At present my code is as follows...
> 
> import random
> import bisect
> 
> class HiScores:
>      def __init__(self,hiScores):
>          self.hiScores=[entry for entry in hiScores]
> 
>      def showScores(self):
>          for score,name in self.hiScores:
>              score=str(score).zfill(5)
>              print "%s - %s" % name,score
> 
> 
>      def addScore(self,score,name):
>          score.zfill(5)
>          bisect.insort(self.hiScores,(score,name))
>          if len(self.hiScores)==6:
>              self.hiScores.pop()
> 
>      def lastScore(self):
>          return self.hiScores[-1][0]
> 
> def main():
>  
> hiScores=[('10000','Alpha'),('07500','Beta'),('05000','Gamma'),('02500','Delta'),('00000','Epsilon')] 
> 
>      a=HiScores(hiScores)
>      print "Original Scores\n---------------"
>      a.showScores()
> 
>      while 1:
>          newScore=str(random.randint(0,10000))
>          if newScore  > a.lastScore():
>              print "Congratulations, you scored %s " % newScore
>              name=raw_input("Please enter your name :")
>              a.addScore(newScore,name)
>              a.showScores()
> 
> if __name__=="__main__":
>      main()
> 
> 
> My first problem (lack of understanding of course) is that if I run the 
> above, I get an error saying:
> 
>      print "%s - %s" % name,score
> TypeError: not enough arguments for format string
> 
> Now I understand what it's saying, but I don't understand why.

The '%' operator expects a tuple or a single value on its right. So you
have to set parentheses around "name, score".

That needs getting used to, but otherwise it can't be discerned from
print ("%s - %s" % name), (score).

> If I change the code to read:
> 
> print "%s - %n" % name, score (thinking of course that ah-ha, score is 
> numeric) then I get the same error.

For integers you can use %s or %i (or %d), see http://docs.python.org/lib/typesseq-strings.html.

> Apologies for going over old ground and if I'm not understanding, I'm 
> getting there honest ;)

No problem. c.l.py is newbie-friendly.

Reinhold