python: get number without decimal places

Question

a=123.45324

is there a function that will return just 123?

Answer 1

int will always truncate towards zero:

>>> a = 123.456
>>> int(a)
123
>>> a = 0.9999
>>> int(a)
0
>>> int(-1.5)
-1

The difference between int and math.floor is that math.floor returns the number as a float, and does not truncate towards zero.

Answer 2

Python 2.x:

import math
int( math.floor( a ) )

N.B. Due to complicated reasons involving the handling of floats, the int cast is safe.

Python 3.x:

import math
math.floor( a )