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Python Python Collections (Retired) Dictionaries Word Count

Jack Mansager
Jack Mansager
14,551 Points
Posted by Jack Mansager
Jack Mansager
14,551 Points

Word Count Challenge Problem. My code works fine in python IDE but won't pass challenge

Any help with this would be awesome!

Jack Mansager
Jack Mansager
14,551 Points
Jack Mansager
Jack Mansager
14,551 Points 
def word_count(sentence):
  lower_sentence = sentence.lower()
  list = lower_sentence.split()
  my_dict = {}
  for items in list:
      count = 1
      if items in my_dict:
          count += 1
      my_dict[items] = count
  return my_dict

word_count("I am that I am")

3 Answers

Chris Freeman
MOD
Chris Freeman
Treehouse Moderator 68,454 Points
Chris Freeman
Chris Freeman
Treehouse Moderator 68,454 Points

Your are accumulating count across all items. Instead increment count for each item as needed:

def word_count(sentence):
  lower_sentence = sentence.lower()
  list = lower_sentence.split()
  my_dict = {}
  for items in list:
      if items in my_dict:
          my_dict[items] += 1
      else:
          my_dict[items] = 1
  return my_dict
Attila Farkas
Attila Farkas
9,323 Points
Attila Farkas
Attila Farkas
9,323 Points

Hi Jack, the problem with your code is the way you update an existing dictionary item when a word is found more than once. The updated dictionary value for such a key is always 2 since your 'count' variable is reset to 1 for each iteration of the for loop. Your code works for a sentence that has no more than two instances of any word, but breaks otherwise. I hope this points you in the right direction to fix the problem.

Jack Mansager
Jack Mansager
14,551 Points
Jack Mansager
Jack Mansager
14,551 Points

Thanks for your help! With your help I now understand how to make it work.