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Python Python Collections (2016, retired 2019) Tuples Tuple Swapping

Akshaan Mazumdar
Akshaan Mazumdar
3,787 Points
Posted by Akshaan Mazumdar
Akshaan Mazumdar
3,787 Points

What is the difference between *args and **kwargs I tried printing (*args) and (**kwargs) in the same function

def add(base,*args): total=base print(base) print("!!") for num in args: print(num) total= num+total

print("!!!")
print(total)

def add2(base,args,*kwargs): print("now printing add2 stuff") print(args) print(kwargs def main(): add(7) x=4 y=7 add2(6,6,8,9,x,y)

main()

1 Answer

Steven Parker
Steven Parker
229,732 Points
Steven Parker
Steven Parker
229,732 Points

The names are not important, but "args" and "kwargs" are common conventions. The "*" operator gathers up individual arguments into a tuple, and the "**" operator gathers up keword/value arguments into a dictionary.

So if I define a function like this: "def splat(*args, **kwargs)", then inside the function, "args" will be a tuple with all the individual arguments that were passed (like "Joe" or 31), an "kwargs" will be a dictionary of the keyword pairs (like "age=21" or "color='blue'").