Switch in Python

Question

I have tried making a switch like statement in python, instead of having a lot of if statements.

The code looks like this:

def findStuff(cds):
    L         


        

Answer 1

(a) I fail to see what is wrong with if...elif...else

(b) I assume that python does not have a switch statement for the same reason that Smalltalk doesn't: it's almost completely redundant, and in the case where you want to switch on types, you can add an appropriate method to your classes; and likewise switching on values should be largely redundant.

Note: I am informed in the comments that whatever Guido's reason for not creating a switch in the first place, PEPs to have it added were rejected on the basis that support for adding such a statement is extremely limited. See: http://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-3103/

(c) If you really need switching behaviour, use a hashtable (dict) to store callables. The structure is:

switch_dict = {
    Foo: self.doFoo,
    Bar: self.doBar,
    }

func = switch_dict[switch_var]
result = func() # or if they take args, pass args