[Tutor] Evaluate my script?

[Kent Johnson]

Adam Gomaa wrote:
> Thanks for your help! I've rewritten it with many of your suggestions
> and will definitely use this as a reference for future scripts.
> 
> Here's the updated one.

>         userInputString=userInput.strip(string.digits)
>         userInputString=userInputString.strip(string.punctuation)# this one
>         userInputString=userInputString.strip(string.digits)
>         userInputString=userInputString.strip(string.whitespace)
>         userInputString=userInputString.strip(string.digits)# and this one. 
>         
>         
>         userInputValue=userInput.strip(string.letters)
>         userInputValue=userInputValue.strip(string.whitespace)

I'm not entirely sure I follow this but I think you could use
userInputString=userInput.strip(string.digits+string.punctuation+string.digits+string.whitespace)
userInputValue=userInput.strip(string.letters+string.whitespace)

>     def convertUnits(startingUnit,value):
>         """Convert the passed value, with startingUnit, into appropriate units
>         for the rest of the module."""
> 
>         #For next if block, each of these should pass value into a lambda
>         # function from the dictionaries above. In theory, then, it should
>         # always convert into kPa, l, or k. 
>         if startingUnit in pressureUnitDict.keys(): #WHY the error?
>             return pressureUnitDict[startingUnit](value)
>             
>         elif startingUnit in volumeUnitDict.keys():
>             return volumeUnitDict[startingUnit](value)
>         
>         elif startingUnit in temperatureUnitDict.keys():
>             return temperatureUnitDict[startingUnit](value)
>         
>         elif startingUnit=='x':
>             return value
>         else:
>             print '###   Unknown unit "%s" -- Using default.  ###' % startingUnit
>             return value

This is ugly. I would either
- pass the correct dict as an argument
- make separate convertPressure(), convertVolume(), convertTemperature() 
functions, which probably will pass the correct dict to a helper function.
- Just put all the conversions in one dict, which will give the same 
functionality you have now.

Kent