Python - how to output set the way/order I declared it

Question

I am new to python and things are little why's and how's. Just got to know "SETS" in python and I seem can't print it out the same order as I declare it. my code:

myPersonels = {"Haime", "Brian", "Ryan", "Jonathan", "Patrick", "Robert", 
               "Renzo", "Rjay", "Daniel", "Angelo"}

print(myPersonels)

output:

 {'Rjay', 'Daniel', 'Jonathan', 'Robert', 'Ryan', 'Renzo', 'Brian', 'Haime', 
 'Angelo', 'Patrick'}

I tried the sorted() method but it gives me the alphabetically order and that's not what I want. I want it to print the same order as I declare it. How can I do that? Any help will be much appreciated thanks.

Possible duplicate of [Set changes element order?](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/9792664/set-changes-element-order) — languitar, Apr 25 '17 at 13:19
So there is really no way I can print it out the way I want? — Joseph Reyes, Apr 25 '17 at 13:20
@JosephReyes Why did you want a set? Would a list do (i.e. `[]`)? If you really want a `set` see http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1653970/does-python-have-an-ordered-set — Chris_Rands, Apr 25 '17 at 13:21

Andrew Jaffe · Answer 1 · 2017-04-25T13:22:52.817

0

Don't use a set -- use a list (or tuple if you will never change the values or length), which retains the ordering.

In [2]: myPersons = ["Haime", "Brian", "Ryan", "Jonathan", "Patrick", "Robert", 
   ...:              "Renzo", "Rjay", "Daniel", "Angelo"]  ## this is a list
   ...: print(myPersons)
   ...:                
   ['Haime', 'Brian', 'Ryan', 'Jonathan', 'Patrick', 'Robert', 'Renzo', 'Rjay', 'Daniel', 'Angelo']

edited Apr 25 '17 at 13:22

answered Apr 25 '17 at 13:21

Andrew Jaffe

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Well it depends what they want, if they want to avoid duplicates and do O(n) membership testing then a list or tuple is not suitable – Chris_Rands Apr 25 '17 at 13:22
@Chris_Rands premature optimization &c &c – Andrew Jaffe Apr 25 '17 at 13:25
It's not just about optimization Andrew, the output will be different if they ever have duplicate names – Chris_Rands Apr 25 '17 at 13:28
@Chris_Rands yes, but the easiest way to ensure that the input order is identical to the output order (which I take to mean including duplicates, but perhaps I am wrong!) is to use a list. Unless the OP also wants to de-duplicate, a list does exactly what is requested. – Andrew Jaffe Apr 25 '17 at 13:31

Python - how to output set the way/order I declared it

1 Answers1