Python elegant assignment based on True/False values

Question

I have a variable I want to set depending on the values in three booleans. The most straight-forward way is an if statement followed by a series of elifs:

if a a         


        

Answer 1

Another option would be to create a helper function:

def first_true(*args):
    true_vals = (arg for arg in args if arg[0])
    return next(true_vals)[1]

name = first_true((a and b and c, 'first'),
                  (a and b and not c, 'second'),
                  (a and not b and c, 'third'),
                  (a and not b and not c, 'fourth'),
                  (not a and b and c, 'fifth'),
                  (not a and b and not c, 'sixth'),
                  (not a and not b and c, 'seventh'),
                  (not a and not b and not c, 'eighth'))

This method assumes that one of the tests passed in will be true. It could also be made lazier with lambdas.