[Tutor] importing variable contents, and variable naming prob lms

[alan.gauld@bt.com]

>>> can i make a variable named the same as the contents of 'item'?? 

You can but its nearly always a bad idea.
Usually you woyuld be better creating a dictionary 
storing your 'variables' by name.

vars = {}
items = ['foo','bar','baz']
for item in items:
   vars[item] = ord(item[0])

for item in items:  
   print vars[item]

>>> 'lion'. any ideas guys?? I could never do this in C, 
>>>  maybe python is different

> I believe you want to use exec.
> 	item = 'lion'
> 	exec ("%s = 'foo'" % item)

You can do it but it's risky - too easy to accidentally
get name collisions etc. Also running exec is risky from 
a security point of view:

item = 'rm -rf /'  # load this from someplace...
exec(item)         # oops!!


Alan g.
Author of the 'Learning to Program' web site
http://www.freenetpages.co.uk/hp/alan.gauld