Basic coin flipper program - logical error help

[Brian van den Broek]

DannyB said unto the world upon 21/02/06 06:14 PM:
> I'm just learning Python.  I've created a simple coin flipper program -
> here is the code:
> 
> [source]
> #Coin flipper
> import random
> 
> heads = 0
> tails = 0
> counter = 0
> 
> coin = random.randrange(2)
> 
> while (counter < 100):
>     if (coin == 0):
>         heads += 1
>         counter += 1
>     else:
>         tails += 1
>         counter += 1
> 
> coin = random.randrange(2)

<snip>


> The program runs - however - it will give me 100 heads OR 100 tails.
> Can someone spot the logic error?  

<snip>

Your original question is long since answered. But I've a style point. 
As Dennis Lee Bieber pointed out, you don't need all three 
accumulators. If you keep to the overall style of your code, you can 
avoid repeating yourself as:


while (counter < 100):
      counter += 1   # No point in putting this in each branch
      coin = random.randrange(2)
      if (coin == 0):
          heads += 1
      else:
          tails += 1


For roughly the same style, I'd go with:

heads = 0
count = 100

for i in range(count):
     if random.randrange(2):
         heads += 1

tails = count - heads

HTH,

Brian vdB