[Tutor] manually sorting variables

[Alan Gauld]

"Christopher Spears" <cspears2002 at yahoo.com> wrote 

> Have the user enter three numeric values and store
> them in three different variables.  Without using
> lists or sorting algorithms, manually sort these three
> numbers from smallest to largest.

Hmm, the restriction of not using a sorting algorithm is interesting.
But if you only have three values its doable. With more than three 
I'm not sure how it would be done.

> def smallest_var(x,y):

So you can get the smallest var.

Now if you could get the biggest then the one that's neither must 
be in the middle.

You are then left with selecting one of 6 possible outcomes:
1,2,3,
1,3,2
2,1,3
2.3.1,
3,1,2
3,2,1

Does that help?

Alternatively you could write a comparison function rather than a 
get smallest/get biggest. That way you can compare the original 
variables rather than creating new ones.

> var1 = raw_input("Enter a number for var1: ")
> var2 = raw_input("Enter a number for var2: ")
> var3 = raw_input("Enter a number for var3: ")

You should convert these to integers!

> small = smallest_var(var1, var2)
> #print small_var_1
> smallest = smallest_var(small, var3)
> print smallest

HTH,

-- 
Alan Gauld
Author of the Learn to Program web site
http://www.freenetpages.co.uk/hp/alan.gauld