Question

Is there a way to repair an error in a program without rewriting the entire program?

Answer 1

hey, you may be confusing the interactive interpreter (write successive commands in a prompt) with running a python text file.

the command line style python interpreter is great for testing out language constructs quickly. however, once you move on to more complex programs you'll often want to create a text file that holds your python commands.

the convention in python is to create a text file with the extension ".py", e.g. "prime.py" that holds the same commands you type into your interpreter. from a command line, you can then run the program with "python <filename>". That way if there are errors, you only have to change the line in your text file that caused the error - not type the whole thing again.

take a look at this if you have more questions:
http://docs.python.org/faq/windows.html#how-do-i-run-a-python-program-under-windows

Answer 2

what julie said

Answer 3

if you're on unix, then you can do > python ps1.py

Answer 4

In addition, on unix, you can add a "shebang" line like this to the beginning of your program:
#! /usr/bin/python
Then you can make your program executable with "chmod +x ps1.py", and then execute it directly with ./ps1.py. This method is used by most system maintenance scripts. On Windows you can make an association with the .py file extension to make Python open all such files. Windows would ignore the shebang line, resulting in one file that might work on Unix/Linux, Windows, and OS X.

Answer 5

Thanks Julie and others,
That was exactly the confusion I had and your help solves the problem.