Question

In Lecture 7's Handout, there is a line as such: type(val) == type(1.0)
what does type(1.0) means? Does it means float by default or do I need to define it somewhere? how bout other types like integers and strings, do they have numbers as well?

Answer 1

That line is asking if val is a float. the function type(val) returns the type of val. So type(1.0) returns float, type (1) would return int, etc.

Answer 2

As something I always wondered, why is that doing something like type(val) == type(1.0), rather than type(val) == float is considered to be the idiomatic way? I always found the second a lot clearer.

Answer 3

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

Answer 4

ooo.. i got it.. so type(1.0) is simply the type of expression '1.0' which is a float? so I can use type(2.0) or type(1.6) as well. i thought type(1.0) was something specific..

Answer 5

or isinstance(val, float)