I'm trying to run a program that administers a quiz based on the contents of a text file. My code looks like this:
This program administers a quiz on US states, capitals, and governors
global for how many questions
HOW_MANY_QUESTIONS=10
open file with answers
answers_file=open('quiz_answers.txt','r')
open file to add results at end
results_file=open('quiz_results.txt','w')
def main():
#dictionary with quiz answers
answer_dictionary={}
#run create dictionary function, result is the answer dictionary
answer_dictionary=create_dictionary(answers_file)
#close the files
answers_file.close()
results_file.close()
go_again='yes'
while go_again=='yes':
#get name
name=input('Enter your name: ')
#initialize count variable
count=0
#accumulator for number of correct answers
number_correct=0
for count in range(0,HOW_MANY_QUESTIONS+1):
#pick question function
answer=pick_question(answer_dictionary)
if answer:
number_correct+=1
results_file.write(name,number_correct)
go_again=input('Go again? ')
def create_dictionary(infile):
#establish a dictionary
dictionary={}
#initialize a key
key=0
#read the first line that is a state
state=infile.readline()
#strip the new line
state=state.rstrip('\n')
#while the line is not blank
while state!='':
#add it as the dictionary key
key=state
#read the capital line
capital=infile.readline()
#strip new line
capital=capital.rstrip('\n')
#read the govenror line
governor=infile.readline()
governor=governor.rstrip('\n')
#assign a list with capital and governor to the state key
dictionary[key]=[capital,governor]
return dictionary
def pick_question(dictionary):
#make a list containing the keys
keys=[]
#isolate the keys and append to the key list
for key in dictionary.keys():
keys.append(key)
#import random
import random
#initialize an index for keys list
key_index=0
#randomly select the state to ask about
state_selection=random.randint(0,len(keys)-1)
key_index=state_selection
#assign value to capital and governor to randomly
#select which question to ask
capital=1
governor=2
#randomly select whether to ask for the governor or the capital
question_choice=random.randint(capital,governor)
#if the question choice is for capital
if question_choice==capital:
#ask the capital question
question=input('What is the capital of',keys[key_index],'? ')
#if the answer is a value for that key
if question in keys[key_index]:
#it is correct
answer=True
#if the question choice is for governor
elif question_choice==governor:
#ask the governor question
question=input('Who is the governor of',keys[key_index],'?')
#if the answer is a value for that key
if question in keys[key_index]:
#it is correct
answer=True
return answer
main()
When I run the program, the error I get is:
state=infile.readline() File"/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/3.6/lib/python3.6/encodings/ascii.py", line 26, in decode return codecs.ascii_decode(input, self.errors)[0] UnicodeDecodeError: 'ascii' codec can't decode byte 0xff in position 36: ordinal not in range(128)
So the problem stems from reading that first line of the text file; what is the issue and how can I fix it? I've never seen this error before. Thanks in advance!
