[Tutor] basic question ...

[Glenn T Norton]

Ravi Kondamuru wrote:

> Hi,
>
> How does one figure all the builtin libraries/ classes that python 
> supports?
>
> For example if I want to sort a list of names, I would normally think 
> of implementing the sorting routine in C. I am just beginning to learn 
> python. It looks like there is a rich set available builtin libraries. 
> So, is there one place where I can look to figure out I dont have to 
> write  afresh.
>
> thanks,
> Ravi.
>
>------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>_______________________________________________
>Tutor maillist  -  Tutor at python.org
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>  
>
A good way to start is the dir() method which will show what is 
available to an object
 >>> mylist = []
 >>> dir(mylist)
['__add__', '__class__', '__contains__', '__delattr__', '__delitem__', 
'__delslice__', '__doc__', '__eq__', '__ge__', '__getattribute__', 
'__getitem__', '__getslice__', '__gt__', '__hash__', '__iadd__', 
'__imul__', '__init__', '__iter__', '__le__', '__len__', '__lt__', 
'__mul__', '__ne__', '__new__', '__reduce__', '__reduce_ex__', 
'__repr__', '__rmul__', '__setattr__', '__setitem__', '__setslice__', 
'__str__', 'append', 'count', 'extend', 'index', 'insert', 'pop', 
'remove', 'reverse', 'sort']
 >>>

 >>> myString = ''
 >>> dir(myString)
['__add__', '__class__', '__contains__', '__delattr__', '__doc__', 
'__eq__', '__ge__', '__getattribute__', '__getitem__', '__getnewargs__', 
'__getslice__', '__gt__', '__hash__', '__init__', '__le__', '__len__', 
'__lt__', '__mod__', '__mul__', '__ne__', '__new__', '__reduce__', 
'__reduce_ex__', '__repr__', '__rmod__', '__rmul__', '__setattr__', 
'__str__', 'capitalize', 'center', 'count', 'decode', 'encode', 
'endswith', 'expandtabs', 'find', 'index', 'isalnum', 'isalpha', 
'isdigit', 'islower', 'isspace', 'istitle', 'isupper', 'join', 'ljust', 
'lower', 'lstrip', 'replace', 'rfind', 'rindex', 'rjust', 'rstrip', 
'split', 'splitlines', 'startswith', 'strip', 'swapcase', 'title', 
'translate', 'upper', 'zfill']
 >>>

also, try the builtin help in the interpreter

 >>> help(mylist.sort)
Help on built-in function sort:

sort(...)
    L.sort(cmpfunc=None) -- stable sort *IN PLACE*; cmpfunc(x, y) -> -1, 
0, 1

 >>>

Good Luck,
Glenn


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Glenn Norton
Application Developer
Nebraska.gov
1-402-471-2777
glenn at nebraska.gov