Use of del in Python

Question

I wrote the following code in python. I was not able to understand the logic behind the output. Can you help me out?

a= [1,2,3]
print(a)
del a[1]
print(a)

The result came out to be [1, 2, 3] [1, 3]

What did you *expect* to happen? You deleted the element at index `1`. — Martijn Pieters, Aug 18 '17 at 18:47
The following two links may be useful: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/11520492/difference-between-del-remove-and-pop-on-lists and https://stackoverflow.com/questions/6146963/when-is-del-useful-in-python — pafede2, Aug 18 '17 at 18:48
indexes start at 0 in python. Maybe that's what you didn't know. — Jean-François Fabre, Aug 18 '17 at 18:55

score 0 · Accepted Answer · answered Aug 18 '17 at 18:58

Okay, Ill try to be as comprehensive as I can

a= [1,2,3] is a list of integers

so print(a) will output the entire list [1,2,3]

now python has a way it counts items in a list with '0' denoting the first item.'1' the second item and so on. In you're case:

item 0 = 1
item 1 = 2
item 2 = 3
del a(1) = del '2'

the new list is:

print (a) = [1,3]

1 Answers1