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10.1: Dictionary Basics

  • Page ID
    117585
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    Learning Objectives

    By the end of this section you should be able to

    • Describe the structure of a dictionary object.
    • Use type() to identify the type of a dictionary object.
    • Explain why a dictionary object does not have duplicate key values.

    Dictionaries

    A dictionary in Python is a container object including key-value pairs. An example of a key-value item is a word in an English dictionary with its corresponding definition.

    Checkpoint: Dictionaries
    Concepts in Practice \(\PageIndex{1}\): Dictionary basics

    Given the dictionary object days = {"Sunday": 1, "Monday": 2, "Tuesday": 3}, what are the keys in the days dictionary object?

    1. "Sunday", "Monday", "Tuesday"
    2. 1, 2, 3
    3. 0, 1, 2
    Answer

    a. The first item in each key-value pair is the key. Hence "Sunday", "Monday", "Tuesday" are key items.

    Concepts in Practice \(\PageIndex{2}\): Dictionary basics

    What are the values in the days dictionary object?

    1. 0, 1, 2
    2. 1, 2, 3
    3. "Sunday", "Monday", "Tuesday"
    Answer

    b. The second item in each key-value pair is the value. Hence 1, 2, 3 are value items.

    Concepts in Practice \(\PageIndex{3}\): Dictionary basics

    What is the value associated with key "Sunday"?

    1. "Sunday"
    2. 1
    3. 0
    Answer

    b. Based on the days dictionary object, the value assigned to "Sunday" is 1.

    Dictionary type and properties

    The dict type implements a dictionary in Python. Since a dictionary object is used to look up values using keys, a dictionary object cannot hold duplicate key values.

    Checkpoint: Dictionary properties
    Concepts in Practice: Dictionary type and properties

    Given the dictionary object encoding = {"a": 97, "b": 98, "A": 65, "B": 66}, answer the following questions.

    Concepts in Practice \(\PageIndex{4}\): Dictionary type and properties

    Given the dictionary object encoding = {"a": 97, "b": 98, "A": 65, "B": 66}, answer the following questions.

    What does type(encoding) return?
    1. dictionary
    2. dict
    3. str
    Answer

    b. The type of a dictionary object is dict.

    Concepts in Practice \(\PageIndex{5}\): Dictionary type and properties

    The encoding dictionary contains duplicate keys since it has both "a" and "A" as keys.

    1. true
    2. false
    Answer

    b. A dictionary cannot have duplicate keys, and "a" and "A" are two different keys because "a" and "A" are different characters.

    Concepts in Practice \(\PageIndex{6}\): Dictionary type and properties

    A dictionary can have duplicate values.

    1. true
    2. false
    Answer

    a. A dictionary can have duplicate values, but not duplicate keys.

    Try It: Investigate variable types

    Given the variables in the code below, examine the variables' types.

    var_1 = ["a1", "b2", "c3"]
    
    var_2 = {"a": 1, "b": 2, "c": 3}
    
    
     
    Answer

    var_1 = ["a1", "b2", "c3"]

    var_2 = {"a": 1, "b": 2, "c": 3}

    print(type(var_1))

    print(type(var_2))


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