Reference to Part of List - Python

Question

If I have a list in python, how can I create a reference to part of the list? For example:

myList = ["*", "*", "*",  "*", "*", "*", "*", "*", "*"]

listPart = myList[0:7:3] #This makes a new list, which is not what I want

myList[0] = "1"

listPart[0]

"1"

Is this possible and if so how would I code it?

Cheers, Joe

Answer 1

You can write a list view type. Here is something I have written as experiment, it is by no means guaranteed to be complete or bug-free

class listview (object):
    def __init__(self, data, start, end):
        self.data = data
        self.start, self.end = start, end
    def __repr__(self):
        return "<%s %s>" % (type(self).__name__, list(self))
    def __len__(self):
        return self.end - self.start
    def __getitem__(self, idx):
        if isinstance(idx, slice):
            return [self[i] for i in xrange(*idx.indices(len(self)))]
        if idx >= len(self):
            raise IndexError
        idx %= len(self)
        return self.data[self.start+idx]
    def __setitem__(self, idx, val):
        if isinstance(idx, slice):
            start, stop, stride = idx.indices(len(self))
            for i, v in zip(xrange(start, stop, stride), val):
                self[i] = v
            return
        if idx >= len(self):
            raise IndexError(idx)
        idx %= len(self)
        self.data[self.start+idx] = val


L = range(10)

s = listview(L, 2, 5)

print L
print s
print len(s)
s[:] = range(3)
print s[:]
print L

Output:

[0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9]
<listview [2, 3, 4]>
3
[0, 1, 2]
[0, 1, 0, 1, 2, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9]

You may assign to indices in the listview, and it will reflect on the underlying list. However,it does not make sense to define append or similar actions on the listview. It may also break if the underlying list changes in length.

Answer 2

Use a slice object or an islice iterator?

http://docs.python.org/library/functions.html#slice