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Start your free trialBryce LiaBraaten
215 PointsWhat exactly does the .format do? Why do we need {} instead of the amount_due variable.
Just trying to understand fully. Why exactly is it like this : print("Each person owes ${}".format(amount_due)). And not like this: print("Each person owes $(amount_due)")
2 Answers
<noob />
17,062 Pointsthe {} is a place holder for a value, use the .format keyword in order to pass the variable u want into the specified place u placed the {}.
Robin Goyal
4,582 PointsF strings are another way to format strings like the way you are describing and behave very similarly to the .format method in strings. F-strings were introduced in Python 3.6 so depending on your version of Python, this won't work. If you place the character f before the first opening quote ("), you can include expressions straight into the placeholder ({}). Here are a few examples.
# Include the variable in the placeholder
>>> print(f"Each person owes ${amount_due}")
# Operations are also possible in the placeholder
>>> number_of_exclamation_marks = 10
>>> print(f"This sentence has lots of exclamation marks{'!' * number_of_exclamation_marks}")
This sentence has lots of exclamation marks!!!!!!!!!!
As you can see, you can also have expressions (single line of code that evaluates to a value) within the placeholders as well. The f-strings way is different from the .format method but once you get the hang of it, it is a very succinct way of formatting strings.
Hope that helps anybody that was curious about this!