Python language: Control Flow

The FOSSEE Group

Department of Aerospace Engineering
IIT Bombay

Mumbai, India

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 1 / 32

Outline

1 Control flow
Basic Conditional flow

2 Control flow
Basic Looping

3 Exercises

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 2 / 32

 Control flow

Outline

1 Control flow
Basic Conditional flow

2 Control flow
Basic Looping

3 Exercises

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 3 / 32

 Control flow

Control flow constructs

if/elif/else : branching
while : looping
for : iterating
break, continue : modify loop
pass : syntactic filler

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 4 / 32

 Control flow Basic Conditional flow

Outline

1 Control flow
Basic Conditional flow

2 Control flow
Basic Looping

3 Exercises

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 5 / 32

 Control flow Basic Conditional flow

if...elif...else example
Type the following code in an editor & save as ladder.py
x = int(input("Enter an integer: "))
if x < 0:
print(’Be positive!’)
elif x == 0:
print(’Zero’)
elif x == 1:
print(’Single’)
else:
print(’More’)

Run in IPython: %run ladder.py

Run on terminal: python ladder.py
FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 6 / 32
 Control flow Basic Conditional flow

if...elif...else example
Type the following code in an editor & save as ladder.py
x = int(input("Enter an integer: "))
if x < 0:
print(’Be positive!’)
elif x == 0:
print(’Zero’)
elif x == 1:
print(’Single’)
else:
print(’More’)

Run in IPython: %run ladder.py

Run on terminal: python ladder.py
FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 6 / 32
 Control flow Basic Conditional flow

Ternary operator

score_str is either ’AA’ or a string of one of

the numbers in the range 0 to 100.
We wish to convert the string to a number using
int
Convert it to 0, when it is ’AA’
if-else construct or the ternary operator

In []: if score_str != ’AA’:

.....: score = int(score_str)
.....: else:
.....: score = 0
FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 7 / 32
 Control flow Basic Conditional flow

Ternary operator

With the ternary operator you can do this:

In []: ss = score_str
In []: score = int(ss) if ss != ’AA’ else 0

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 8 / 32

 Control flow

Outline

1 Control flow
Basic Conditional flow

2 Control flow
Basic Looping

3 Exercises

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 9 / 32

 Control flow Basic Looping

Outline

1 Control flow
Basic Conditional flow

2 Control flow
Basic Looping

3 Exercises

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 10 / 32

 Control flow Basic Looping

while: motivational problem

Example: Fibonacci series

Sum of previous two elements defines the next:

0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, ...

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 11 / 32

 Control flow Basic Looping

How do you solve this?

Task: Give computer, instructions to solve this

How would you solve it?

How would you tell someone to solve it?

Assume you are given the starting values, 0 and 1.

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 12 / 32

 Control flow Basic Looping

while: Fibonacci
Example: Fibonacci series
Sum of previous two elements defines the next:

0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, ...

1
Start with: a, b = 0, 1
2
Next element: next = a + b
3
Shift a, b to next values
a = b
b = next
4
Repeat steps 2, 3 when b < 30

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 13 / 32

 Control flow Basic Looping

while: Fibonacci
Example: Fibonacci series
Sum of previous two elements defines the next:

0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, ...

1
Start with: a, b = 0, 1
2
Next element: next = a + b
3
Shift a, b to next values
a = b
b = next
4
Repeat steps 2, 3 when b < 30

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 13 / 32

 Control flow Basic Looping

while: Fibonacci
Example: Fibonacci series
Sum of previous two elements defines the next:

0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, ...

1
Start with: a, b = 0, 1
2
Next element: next = a + b
3
Shift a, b to next values
a = b
b = next
4
Repeat steps 2, 3 when b < 30

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 13 / 32

 Control flow Basic Looping

while: Fibonacci
Example: Fibonacci series
Sum of previous two elements defines the next:

0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, ...

1
Start with: a, b = 0, 1
2
Next element: next = a + b
3
Shift a, b to next values
a = b
b = next
4
Repeat steps 2, 3 when b < 30

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 13 / 32

 Control flow Basic Looping

while: Fibonacci
Example: Fibonacci series
Sum of previous two elements defines the next:

0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, ...

1
Start with: a, b = 0, 1
2
Next element: next = a + b
3
Shift a, b to next values
a = b
b = next
4
Repeat steps 2, 3 when b < 30

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 13 / 32

 Control flow Basic Looping

while

In []: a, b = 0, 1
In []: while b < 30:
...: print(b, end=’ ’)
...: next = a + b
...: a = b
...: b = next
...:
...:

Do this manually to check logic

Note: Indentation determines scope

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 14 / 32

 Control flow Basic Looping

while

We can eliminate the temporary next:

In []: a, b = 0, 1
In []: while b < 30:
...: print(b, end=’ ’)
...: a, b = b, a + b
...:
...:
1 1 2 3 5 8 13 21
Simple!

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 15 / 32

 Control flow Basic Looping

for . . . range()

Example: print squares of first 5 numbers

In []: for i in range(5):
....: print(i, i * i)
....:
....:
0 0
1 1
2 4
3 9
4 16

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 16 / 32

 Control flow Basic Looping

range()
range([start,] stop[, step])
range() returns a sequence of integers
The start and the step arguments are optional
stop is not included in the sequence

Documentation convention
Anything within [] is optional
Nothing to do with Python

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 17 / 32

 Control flow Basic Looping

for . . . range()

Example: print squares of odd numbers from 3 to 9

In []: for i in range(3, 10, 2):
....: print(i, i * i)
....:
....:
3 9
5 25
7 49
9 81

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 18 / 32

 Control flow Basic Looping

Exercise with for

Convert the Fibonnaci sequence example to use a for

loop with range.

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 19 / 32

 Control flow Basic Looping

Solution

a, b = 0, 1
for i in range(10):
print(b, end=’ ’)
a, b = b, a + b

Note that the while loop is a more natural fit here

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 20 / 32

 Control flow Basic Looping

break, continue, and pass

Use break to break out of loop

Use continue to skip an iteration
Use pass as syntactic filler

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 21 / 32

 Control flow Basic Looping

break example

Find first number in Fibonnaci sequence < 100 divisible

by 4:
a, b = 0, 1
while b < 500:
if b % 4 == 0:
print(b)
break
a, b = b, a + b

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 22 / 32

 Control flow Basic Looping

continue

Skips execution of rest of the loop on current

iteration
Jumps to the end of this iteration
Squares of all odd numbers below 10, not
multiples of 3

In []: for n in range(1, 10, 2):

.....: if n%3 == 0:
.....: continue
.....: print(n*n)

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 23 / 32

 Control flow Basic Looping

pass example
Try this:
for i in range(5):
if i % 2 == 0:
pass
else:
print(i, ’is Odd’)
pass: does nothing
Keep Python syntactically happy
Another example:
while True:
pass
FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 24 / 32
 Exercises

Outline

1 Control flow
Basic Conditional flow

2 Control flow
Basic Looping

3 Exercises

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 25 / 32

 Exercises

Problem 1.1: Armstrong numbers

Write a program that displays all three digit numbers

that are equal to the sum of the cubes of their digits.
That is, print numbers abc that have the property
abc = a3 + b3 + c 3
For example, 153 = 13 + 53 + 33

Hints
Break problem into easier pieces
How would you solve the problem?
Can you explain to someone else how to solve it?

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 26 / 32

 Exercises

Some hints

What are the possible three digit numbers?

Can you split 153 into its respective digits,
a = 1, b = 5, c = 3?
With a, b, c can you test if it is an Armstrong
number?

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 27 / 32

 Exercises

Solution: part 1

x = 153
a = x//100
b = (x%100)//10
c = x%10

(a**3 + b**3 + c**3) == x

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 28 / 32

 Exercises

Solution: part 2

x = 100
while x < 1000:
print(x)
x += 1 # x = x + 1

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 29 / 32

 Exercises

Solution

x = 100
while x < 1000:
a = x//100
b = (x%100)//10
c = x%10
if (a**3 + b**3 + c**3) == x:
print(x)
x += 1

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 30 / 32

 Exercises

Problem 1.2: Collatz sequence

1
Start with an arbitrary (positive) integer.
2
If the number is even, divide by 2; if the number is
odd, multiply by 3 and add 1.
3
Repeat the procedure with the new number.
4
It appears that for all starting values there is a
cycle of 4, 2, 1 at which the procedure loops.
Write a program that accepts the starting value and
prints out the Collatz sequence.

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 31 / 32

 Exercises

What did we learn?

Conditionals: if elif else

Looping: while & for
range
break, continue, pass
Solving simple problems

FOSSEE Team (FOSSEE – IITB) Control flow 32 / 32