Welcome to the Treehouse Community

Want to collaborate on code errors? Have bugs you need feedback on? Looking for an extra set of eyes on your latest project? Get support with fellow developers, designers, and programmers of all backgrounds and skill levels here with the Treehouse Community! While you're at it, check out some resources Treehouse students have shared here.

Looking to learn something new?

Treehouse offers a seven day free trial for new students. Get access to thousands of hours of content and join thousands of Treehouse students and alumni in the community today.

Start your free trial

Python Python Basics (2015) Letter Game App Letter Game Refinement

Andrei Oprescu
Andrei Oprescu
9,547 Points

Does anyone know why my code is going bananas?

This code is taken from the course and I don't know why it is going crazy:

import random


words = [
    'apple',
    'banana',
    'orange',
    'coconut',
    'strawberry',
    'lime',
    'grapefruit',
    'lemon',
    'kumquat',
    'blueberry',
    'melon',
]


while True:

    start = input("Press enter/return to start, or enter Q to quit.")

    if start.lower() == 'q':

      break


    secret_word = random.choice(words)

    bad_guesses = []

    good_guesses = []



   while len(bad_guesses) < 7 and len(list(good_guesses)) != len(secret_word):

     for letter in secret_word:

       if letter in  good_guesses:

          print(letter, end='')

        else:

         print('_', end='')



    print('')

    print("Strikes: {}/7".format(len(bad_guesses)))

    print('')



    guess = input("Guess a letter:  ").lower()


    if len(guess) != 1:

      print("You can only guess a single letter!")

      continue

    elif guess in bad_guesses or guess in good_guesses:

      print("You have already guesses this letter before!")

      continue

    elif not guess.isalpha():

      print("You can only guess letters!")

      continue


    if guess in secret_word:

      good_guess.append(guess)

      if len(good_guesses) == len(list(secret_word)):

        print("You win! The word was {}.".format(secret_word))

        break

    else:

 bad_guess.append(guess)

else:

print("You didn't guess it! My secret word was {}".format(secret_word))

Can you help me solve this?

Thanks

[MOD: added ```python formatting -cf]

1 Answer

Chris Freeman
MOD
Chris Freeman
Treehouse Moderator 68,457 Points

A common error in this code problem is using len(list(secret_word)) provides undesired length if there are repeated letters in the secret word, such as "banana". Only three correct guesses should match, but you'll never get 6 correct guesses. Hint: use set instead of list.

Post back if this doesn't solve your problem. Good luck!!