What is the difference between a list and a tuple?
If your first answer was Lists are mutable and Tuples are immutable - well you’re right. But can you explain them?
If yes, then great. Else, you might want to go through this page.
Let’s take a list and a tuple
myList = [1,2,3,4,5]
myTuple = (1,2,3,4,5)
now let’s add perform some actions on these datatypes.
lets replace the first element in the list
myList = [1,2,3,4,5]
myTuple = (1,2,3,4,5)
myList[0] = 10
print(myList)
"""
OUTPUT
[10, 2, 3, 4, 5]
"""
well, we’re able to do that since it is mutable.
now let’s do the same thing with the list.
myList = [1,2,3,4,5]
myTuple = (1,2,3,4,5)
myTuple[0] = 10
print(myTuple)
"""
ERROR!
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "<main.py>", line 11, in <module>
TypeError: 'tuple' object does not support item assignment
"""
We get an error because a tuple once defined, cannot be altered.
Similarly any operation you do with a list (like append, pop) will result in the same error when you try to do it to a tuple.
This is pretty basic, so ensure you’re solid on this.