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Python Python Collections (2016, retired 2019) Lists Disemvowel

Posted by Alvaro Arroyo
Alvaro Arroyo
1,084 Points

What is wrong with the code?

I can't figure out why it doesn't work. I've run it in IDLE and works perfectly.

disemvowel.py 
def disemvowel(word):
    vowels = ["a", "e", "i", "o", "u"]
    index = 0
    word = list(word)
    for letter in word:
        try:
            word.remove(vowels[index])
            word.remove(vowels[index].upper())
        except ValueError:
            pass
        else:
            index += 1

    word = "".join(word)           
    return word

1 Answer

Quinton Gordon
Quinton Gordon
10,985 Points
Quinton Gordon
Quinton Gordon
10,985 Points

There are a couple issues to address in this code. To start let's remove the "else" clause. In a Try...Except statement the "else" is used if you want to process code after the initial line but not catch any possible exceptions with the new code. In practice that else does not really add much and it's not being called the way you envisioned. So let us just junk it.

Then let's remove the statement checking for the uppercase as it will never run in practice unless there is a lowercase version of the vowel also present. So instead try lowercasing the word in advance before your loop.

You were trying to rely on the "else" to push the iteration along by increasing the index. Unfortunately that else would never be interpreted on a non-vowel and thus the index would never increase except for when a vowel was present on the iteration. So to push the iteration forward I added a step to the exception to increase the index and I dropped the "pass" as we really got no value from that. 

def disemvowel(word):
    vowels = ["a", "e", "i", "o", "u"]
    index = 0
    word = word.lower()
    word = list(word)
    for letter in word:
        try:
            word.remove(vowels[index])
        except ValueError:
            index += 1

    word = "".join(word)
    return word
Alvaro Arroyo
Alvaro Arroyo
1,084 Points

Thank you so much for taking the time to answer! That surely helps!!