Python making a string a choice?

Question

Solving a shipping programming problem for school, just started with python 2.7.5, trying to make US or Canada a choice, as it stands I had to make a numerical choice to get this to work, I'm trying to get the choice for the prompt as US or Canada and not assign a number, do I have to declare something as a string? If I use Canada or US it gives me an error message about a global variable. rough draft with number choice:

def main ():
    user_ship_area = input('Are you shipping to the US or Canada? Type 1 for US, 2 for   Canada') 

    if user_ship_area != 2:
      print 'confirmed, we will ship to the United States '
    else:
      print "confirmed, we will ship to Canada" 

main()

I get an Error message when I use Canada or US under if

user_ship_area = input('Are you shipping to the US or Canada?') 
if user_ship_area != Canada:
    print 'confirmed, we will ship to the United States '
else:
    print "confirmed, we will ship to Canada"

You should write 'Canada' as string literal, not a directive Canada — Denis, Oct 10 '13 at 14:47
You should use `raw_input` rather than `input`. `raw_input` will take a string from the user: `input` will take a Python expression (like an integer 2) — David Robinson, Oct 10 '13 at 14:48
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/7709022/is-it-ever-useful-to-use-pythons-input-over-raw-input — Josh Lee, Oct 10 '13 at 14:50

score 2 · Accepted Answer · edited Oct 10 '13 at 15:27

2

Use raw_input instead of input

def main ():
    user_ship_area = raw_input('Are you shipping to the US or Canada?') 

    if user_ship_area != 'Canada':
        print 'confirmed, we will ship to the United States '
    else:
        print "confirmed, we will ship to Canada" 

main()

edited Oct 10 '13 at 15:27

answered Oct 10 '13 at 14:49

Alexander Zhukov

4,357
1
20
31

score 1 · Answer 2 · answered Oct 10 '13 at 14:49

In your code, Canada will be parsed as variable, but it should be a string. Also, if you're using Python 2.x, then use raw_input instead of input, because the second one will evaluate your inputted string. So, your code should looks like:

user_ship_area = raw_input('Are you shipping to the US or Canada?') 
if user_ship_area != 'Canada':
    print 'confirmed, we will ship to the United States '
else:
    print "confirmed, we will ship to Canada"

score 0 · Answer 3 · answered Oct 10 '13 at 14:49

0

You missed a ' mark on

user_ship_area = input('Are you shipping to the US or Canada?') #<--- here 
  #<--an indent here.  v      v  quotes to indicate string here  
  if user_ship_area != 'Canada':
    print 'You picked Canada!'

answered Oct 10 '13 at 14:49

gregb212

799
6
10

Python making a string a choice?

3 Answers3