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Python Python Collections (2016, retired 2019) Tuples Packing

Posted by Kirome Thompson
Kirome Thompson
5,350 Points

How to create a multiply method that accepts *args and multiplies all the values and returns the product?

Let's play with the *args pattern. Create a function named multiply that takes any number of arguments. Return the product (multiplied value) of all of the supplied arguments. The type of argument shouldn't matter. Slices might come in handy for this one.

twoples.py 
def multiply(*args):
    total = 0
    for num in args:
        total *= args[num::1]
    return total

3 Answers

diogorferreira
diogorferreira
19,363 Points
diogorferreira
diogorferreira
19,363 Points

Hey Kirome, Your function is mostly correct with only a few errors.

  • When you loop through all of the args num is set to each separate e.g if the args were 2, 7, 4, 5, 5, num during the first iteration would be 2 and then 7 and so on. So there is no need to use args[num::1]
    (just a heads up the slice method already has a step of 1 by default so you don't need to include it unless you are specifying a step like 2 or 3.)
  • The only other thing I found is that make sure you set your initial multiplying varible (total) to 1 - if you multiply your initial arg by 0 it will always return 0
def multiply(*args):
    total = 1
    for num in args:
        total *= num
    return total
Kirome Thompson
Kirome Thompson
5,350 Points
Kirome Thompson
Kirome Thompson
5,350 Points

thanks a lot for the help managed to get there in the end appreciate this exactly what I got :)