Assign variable in while loop condition in Python?

Question

I just came across this piece of code

while 1:
    line = data.readline()
    if not line:
        break
    #...

and thought, there must

Answer 1

If data is a file, as stated in other answers, using for line in file will work fine. If data is not a file, and a random data reading object, then you should implement it as an iterator, implementing __iter__ and next methods.

The next method should to the reading, check if there is more data, and if not, raise StopIteration. If you do this, you can continue using the for line in data idiom.