Chapters 5

Loops
Introduction
 A loop can be used to tell a program to execute statements
repeatedly.
 Suppose that you need to display a string (e.g., programming is
fun!) 100 times.
count = 0
while count < 100:
print("Programming is fun!")
count = count + 1

Python provides two types of loop statements: while loops and

for loops.
The while loop is a condition-controlled loop; it is controlled by
a true/false condition.
The for loop is a count-controlled loop that repeats a specified
number of times.
The while Loop
https://docs.python.org/3/reference/compound_stmts.html#the-while-statement

 A while loop executes statements repeatedly as long as a

condition remains true.
 The syntax for the while loop is:
while loop-continuation-condition:
# Loop body
Statement(s)
 RepeatSubtractionQuiz.py
import random
# 1. Generate two random single-digit integers
number1 = random.randint(0, 9)
number2 = random.randint(0, 9)

# 2. If number1 < number2, swap number1 with number2

if number1 < number2:
number1, number2 = number2, number1

# 3. Prompt the student to answer "What is number1 - number2?"

answer = eval(input("What is " + str(number1) + " - " +
str(number2) + "? "))

# 4. Repeatedly ask the question until the answer is correct

while number1 - number2 != answer:
answer = eval(input("Wrong answer. Try again. What is " +
str(number1) + " - " + str(number2) + "? "))

print("You got it!")

Loop Design Strategies
 Step 1: Identify the statements that need to be repeated.
 Step 2: Wrap these statements in a loop like this:

while True:
Statements

 Step 3: Code the loop-continuation-condition and add

appropriate statements for controlling the loop.

while loop-continuation-condition:
Statements
Additional statements for controlling the loop
Multiple Subtraction Quiz
 SubtractionQuiz.py, generates just one question for each
run. How do you write the code to generate five questions?
 The program that generates five questions and, after a
student answers all of them, reports the number of correct
answers. The program also displays the time spent on the
test, as shown in the sample run.
What is 2 - 0? 2
You are correct!
What is 9 - 6? 3
You are correct!
What is 7 - 0? 7
You are correct!
What is 2 - 0? 2
You are correct!
What is 4 - 2? 2
You are correct!
Correct count is 5 out of 5
Test time is 15 seconds
Controlling a Loop with User
Confirmation
 If you want the user to decide whether to take another
question, you can offer a user confirmation. The template of
the program can be coded as follows:

continueLoop = 'Y'
while continueLoop == ‘Y’:
# Execute the loop body once
...
# Prompt the user for confirmation
continueLoop = input("Enter Y to continue and N to
quit: ")
Controlling a Loop with a Sentinel
Value
 Another common technique for controlling a loop is to
designate a special input value, known as a sentinel value,
which signifies the end of the input. A loop that uses a
sentinel value in this way is called a sentinel-controlled loop.

data = eval(input("Enter an integer (the input ends " +

"if it is 0): "))
# Keep reading data until the input is 0
sum = 0
while data != 0:
sum += data
data = eval(input("Enter an integer (the input ends " +
"if it is 0): "))

print("The sum is", sum)

Input and Output Redirections
 if you have a lot of data to enter, You can store the data in a
text file (e.g. input.txt) and run the program by using the
following command:
python SentinelValue.py < input.txt

 This command is called input redirection. Instead of having

the user type the data from the keyboard at runtime, the
program takes the input from the file input.txt.
 output redirection can send the output to a file instead of
displaying it on the screen. The command for output
redirection is:
python Script.py > output.txt
 Examples
 How many times are the following loop bodies repeated? What is
the printout of each loop?
i = 1 i = 1 i = 1
while i < 10: while i < 10: while i < 10:
if i % 2 == 0: if i % 2 == 0: if i % 2 == 0:
print(i) print(i) print(i)
i += 1 i += 1

Show the errors in the following code:

count = 0 count = 0 count = 0
while count < 100: while count < 100: while count < 100:
print(count) print(count) count += 1
count -= 1
The for Loop
 A Python for loop iterates through each value in a sequence.
 Often you know exactly how many times the loop body needs to
be executed, so a control variable can be used to count the
executions. A loop of this type is called a counter-controlled loop.

i = initialValue # Initialize loop-control variable

while i < endValue:
# Loop body
...
i += 1 # Adjust loop-control variable

 A for loop can be used to simplify the preceding loop:

for i in range(initialValue, endValue):
# Loop body
In general, the syntax for var in sequence:
of a for loop is: # Loop body
 The function range
 The function range(a, b) returns the sequence of integers
a, a + 1, ..., b - 2, and b - 1.
 range(a) is the same as range(0, a).
 k is used as step value in range(a, b, k). The first number
in the sequence is a. Each successive number in the
sequence will increase by the step value k. b is the limit. The
last number in the sequence must be less than b.
>>> for v in range(3, 9, 2):
>>> for v in range(4, 8):
... print(v)
... print(v)
...
... >>> for v in range(5, 1, -1):
3
4 ... print(v)
5
5 ...
7
6 5
>>>
7 4
>>> 3
2
Examples
 Count the number of iterations in the following loops:

count = 0 for count in range(n):

while count < n: print(count)
count += 1

count = 5 count = 5
while count < n: while count < n:
count += 1 count = count + 3
Nested Loops
 A loop can be nested inside another loop.
 Nested loops consist of an outer loop and one or more inner
loops. Each time the outer loop is repeated, the inner loops
are reentered and started anew.
 Ex: write a program that uses nested for loops to display a
multiplication table.
 MultiplicationTable.py
print(" Multiplication Table")
# Display the number title
print(" |", end = '')
for j in range(1, 10):
print(" ", j, end = '')
print() # Jump to the new line
print("——————————————————————————————————————————")

# Display table body

for i in range(1, 10):
print(i, "|", end = '')
for j in range(1, 10):
# Display the product and align properly
print(format(i * j, "4d"), end = '')
print() # Jump to the new line
Examples
 Show the output of the following programs
Keywords break and continue
 The break and continue keywords provide additional
controls to a loop.
 You can use the keyword break in a loop to immediately
terminate a loop.
sum = 0
number = 0
while number < 20:
number += 1
sum += number
if sum >= 100:
break
print("The number is", number)
print("The sum is", sum)

The number is 14
The sum is 105
Keywords break and continue
 You can also use the continue keyword in a loop. When it is
encountered, it ends the current iteration and program control
goes to the end of the loop body
sum = 0
number = 0
while number < 20:
number += 1
if number == 10 or number == 11:
continue
sum += number

print("The sum is", sum)

The sum is 189

Displaying Prime Numbers
 An integer greater than 1 is prime if its only positive divisor is 1
or itself. For example, 2, 3, 5, and 7 are prime numbers, but 4, 6,
8, and 9 are not.
 Write a program that displays the first fifty prime numbers in
five lines, each containing ten numbers.

>>>
The first 50 prime numbers are
2 3 5 7 11 13 17 19 23 29
31 37 41 43 47 53 59 61 67 71
73 79 83 89 97 101 103 107 109 113
127 131 137 139 149 151 157 163 167 173
179 181 191 193 197 199 211 223 227 229
PROGRAMMING EXERCISES
 Q1: Write a program that prompts the user to enter the
number of students and each student’s score, and displays
the highest score. Assume that the input is stored in a file
named score.txt, and the program obtains the input from the
file.
 Q2: Use nested loops that display the following patterns in
four separate programs:
PROGRAMMING EXERCISES
 Q3: Write a program that lets the user enter the loan amount
and loan period in number of years and displays the monthly
and total payments for each interest rate starting from 5% to
8%, with an increment of 1/8. Here is a sample run:
 M = P * ( J / (1 - (1 + J)-N)). Follow the steps below for a
detailed guide to using this formula, or refer to this quick
explanation of each variable:
 M = payment amount
 P = principal, meaning the amount of money borrowed
 J = effective interest rate. Note that this is usually not the
annual interest rate; see below for an explanation.
 N = total number of payments

 http://www.hughcalc.org/formula.php