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
Brenda Darden Wilkerson
1,581 Pointshow do i create a function
Need help
1 Answer
Chris Freeman
Treehouse Moderator 68,441 PointsLet's step through the challenge Task 1.
Task 1 says "Make a function named add_list that takes a list. The function should then add all of the items in the list together and return the total. Assume the list contains only numbers. You'll probably want to use a for loop. You will not need to use input().
Step 1; "Make a function named add_list that takes a list...."
# making (or defining) a function is done with the keyword 'def' followed by
# the name of the function, the list of arguments, and a colon ':'. Here I am
# choosing to call the argument 'lst' (I don't use 'list' since it's a builtin function name)
def add_list(lst):
pass #temporary code block for now....
Step 2: " The function should then add all of the items in the list together..."
# replacing the temporary code block 'pass' with loop to add the list items together
def add_list(lst):
# set our current total to 0.
total = 0
# for each item in the passed-in argument 'lst'...
for item in lst:
# added each item to the total
total = total + item
Step 3: "and return the total."
# Add return statement
def add_list(lst):
# set our current total to 0.
total = 0
# for each item in the passed-in argument 'lst'...
for item in lst:
# added each item to the total
total = total + item
# return current total value
return total