4 Ways To Shorten Your Python Code Like A Pro

One reason why so many programmers are a fan of Python is probably because of how concise it is. When we want to print "hello world", we tell Python to print "hello world" instead of defining a class, public static void main method and all that stuff. In this article, let’s take a look at a couple of ways to shorten your Python code even further

1) List Comprehension

Let’s say we have a list [1,2,3] and we wish to create another list with each number multiplied by 2 [2,4,6].

The Normal Way

lis = [1,2,3]
output = []
for number in lis:
    output.append(number * 2)
# output will be [2,4,6]

If we do this the normal way, we usually create an empty list to start with output. We then iterate through lis, and append number * 2 to output, and we end up with output being [2,4,6].

Using List Comprehension

If we use list comprehension, we can do this in 1 line instead of 3

lis = [1,2,3]
output = [number * 2 for number in lis]
# output will be [2,4,6]

How This Works

lis = [1,2,3]
lis2 = [number for number in lis]