How to convert an associative array in python?

Question

I am really new to python and I can't find any information about this. I have an associative array item,

item['id'] = 0
item['title'] = 'python'

I want to validate the contents of item but I dont want to use the index name like 'title' but just have a for loop and iterate over all entries in item regardless of their meaning. Something like that

for a in range(0, len(item)):
    print (item[a])

Any ideas or suggestions?

Answer 1

In Python, associative arrays are called dictionaries.

A good way to iterate through a dict is to use .iteritems():

for key, value in item.iteritems():
    print key, value 

If you only need the values, use .itervalues():

for value in item.itervalues():
    print value 

As you learn more about Python and dictionaries, take note of the difference between .iteritems()/itervalues() (which returns an iterator) and items()/values()(which returns a list (array)).

In Python 3

.iteritems()/.itervalues() have been removed and items()/values()/keys() return iterators on the corresponding sequences.

for key, value in item.items():
    print(key)
    print(value)

Answer 2

There are three ways to iterate a dictionary:

item = {...}
for key in item: # alternatively item.iterkeys(), or item.keys() in python 3
    print key, item[key]

item = {...}
for value in item.itervalues(): # or item.values() in python 3
    print value

item = {...}
for key, value in item.iteritems(): # or item.items() in python 3
    print key, value