[Tutor] Selecting first matching element from a list

[wesley chun]

> 1) itertools.dropwhile(cond, lst) will return a list with the desired element first.

i think in order to use this, the OP needs to invert his Boolean logic
because it *drops* elements while the conditional is True. as soon as
it hits False the 1st time, all remaining elements (including the one
that breaks the "while) is yielded. once he flips it, a single call to
next() with a try-except StopIteration will be similar to the code in
your msg:

results = itertools.dropwhile(invCond, lst)
try:
     desired = results.next()
except StopIteration:
    deal with element not found

bob's 2) and 3) are spot on.

hope this helps!
-- wesley
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"Python Fundamentals", Prentice Hall, (c)2009
    http://corepython.com

wesley.j.chun :: wescpy-at-gmail.com
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