Check if letters in list add up to a variable

Question

Lets say I have a list letters = ["a", "c", "t"], how would I check if those letters could make the word "cat"?

Possible duplicate of [append vs. extend](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/252703/append-vs-extend) — Patrick Haugh, Nov 16 '16 at 21:01
How would I convert the list to be in the order that the word is? So how would I make this list ['c', 'a', 't'] — Hugh Chalmers, Nov 16 '16 at 21:12

score 0 · Accepted Answer · answered Nov 16 '16 at 21:11

0

Not sure why your question is drawing so much bad attention. permutations are what you need:

from itertools import permutations

def is_perm(letters,word):
    for p in permutations(letters):
        if ''.join(p) == word: return True
    return False
letters = ["a", "c", "t"]
word = 'cat'
print is_perm(letters,word)

Letters may of course be any list of strings, not just letters.

answered Nov 16 '16 at 21:11

kabanus

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It used to be a different question, but I changed that. However since then it's still been going down. Not sure why, too. Thanks for the help tho. :) – Hugh Chalmers Nov 16 '16 at 21:12
2

I did not personally downvote, but I believe others may have done so because you did not show that you attempted anything before asking the question. – Elliot Roberts Nov 16 '16 at 21:18
+ Elliot Roberts Makes sense I guess. – Hugh Chalmers Nov 16 '16 at 21:20
People should really comment when they downvote, it's polite and helpful. Otherwise you're missing the point of stackexchange, helping (IMO). – kabanus Nov 16 '16 at 21:21
1

@kabanus people also tend to downvote answers to lazy questions, to discourage users from answering them. I guess this is what happened here. – vaultah Nov 16 '16 at 21:28
@HughChalmers if this answers your question you should mark it accepted with the check mark to the left `<------` – Wayne Werner Dec 01 '16 at 14:01

score 0 · Answer 2 · answered Nov 16 '16 at 21:14

This would do the job. It checks to see if all of the letters are in the word, and all of the word letters are in the list.

letters = ['c', 'a', 't']
word = "cat"

def check_word(lst, word):
    for letter in lst:
        if letter not in word:
            return False # "this series does not work"

    for letter in list(word):
        if letter not in lst:
            return False # "this series does not work"


    return True # "this works"

check_word(letters, word) # returns True

Check if letters in list add up to a variable

2 Answers2