I basically want a python equivalent of this in C:
int a[x];
but in python I declare an array like:
a = []
and the problem is I want to assign random slots with values like:
a[4] = 1
but I can't do that with python, since the array is empty.
This question is related to
python
arrays
dynamic-arrays
You can use numpy:
import numpy as np
Example from Empty Array:
np.empty([2, 2])
array([[ -9.74499359e+001, 6.69583040e-309],
[ 2.13182611e-314, 3.06959433e-309]])
If you (or other searchers of this question) were actually interested in creating a contiguous array to fill with integers, consider bytearray and memoryivew:
# cast() is available starting Python 3.3
size = 10**6
ints = memoryview(bytearray(size)).cast('i')
ints.contiguous, ints.itemsize, ints.shape
# (True, 4, (250000,))
ints[0]
# 0
ints[0] = 16
ints[0]
# 16
Just declare the list and append each element. For ex:
a = []
a.append('first item')
a.append('second item')
If you actually want a C-style array
import array
a = array.array('i', x * [0])
a[3] = 5
try:
[5] = 'a'
except TypeError:
print('integers only allowed')
Note that there's no concept of un-initialized variable in python. A variable is a name that is bound to a value, so that value must have something. In the example above the array is initialized with zeros.
However, this is uncommon in python, unless you actually need it for low-level stuff. In most cases, you are better-off using an empty list or empty numpy array, as other answers suggest.
You can't do exactly what you want in Python (if I read you correctly). You need to put values in for each element of the list (or as you called it, array).
But, try this:
a = [0 for x in range(N)] # N = size of list you want
a[i] = 5 # as long as i < N, you're okay
For lists of other types, use something besides 0. None
is often a good choice as well.
also you can extend that with extend method of list.
a= []
a.extend([None]*10)
a.extend([None]*20)
x=[]
for i in range(0,5):
x.append(i)
print(x[i])
Source: Stackoverflow.com