See on http://www.sagemath.org/doc/thematic_...
From the section "Modifying lists: reverse, sort, ...":
L = [4,2,5,1,3]
L.reverse()
sage: [3, 1, 5, 2, 4]
However I see -- nothing.
print L.reverse()
gives 'None'. I am using Sage 5.8.
The method .reverse() reverses the list L on place (it modifies the list L as stated in the tutorial), it does not return a reversed copy of L (it returns nothing, hence your behaviour), but the list L itself is modified as you can check:
sage: L = [4,2,5,1,3]
sage: L.reverse()
sage: L
[3, 1, 5, 2, 4]
Now if you want to get a reversed copy of L without modifying L, you can use the reversed() function:
sage: L = [4,2,5,1,3]
sage: L2 = reversed(L)
sage: L2
<listreverseiterator at 0x65a5d50>
As you can see, it returns an iterator, not a list, it means that you can still play with it as if it was a list, but only once (the elements of L2 are thrown once used):
sage: for i in L2:
....: print i
....:
3
1
5
2
4
sage: for i in L2:
....: print i
....:
<nothing printed>
If you want to get a reversed list of L without modifying L you can transform the reversed iterator into a list:
sage: L = [4,2,5,1,3]
sage: L2 = list(reversed(L))
sage: L2
[3, 1, 5, 2, 4]
Thanks! Somehow I am used to assume that L.reverse() returns the reversed L. Am I the only one who finds this behaviour more natural?
I think it is about english language: `reverse` reverses the list `reversED` returns the reversed list. As for me, the main "issue" is that `reversed()` is a function, not a method, which you can not guess by tab completion. By the way, both features are Python (not Sage) builtins.
To complement Thierry's answer, here is another way to get a reversed list:
sage: L = [4,2,5,1,3]
sage: L[::-1]
[3, 1, 5, 2, 4]
This produces a new list. The original list is unchanged.
"it seems that reversed(L) is faster.." Of course, because it just returns a pointer to a function but does reverse anything. I am still very unhappy with this counterintuitive parlance which is also not in accordance with English language.
Asked: 2013-08-02 05:42:57 +0100
Seen: 6,844 times
Last updated: Aug 02 '13
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