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Date: Sun, 9 Feb 2014 12:46:27 +1100
Subject: Re: Python 2.7.6 help with modules
From: Chris Angelico <rosuav@gmail.com>
Cc: "python-list@python.org" <python-list@python.org>
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On Sun, Feb 9, 2014 at 12:21 PM, Scott W Dunning <swdunning@cox.net> wrote:
> I figured it out!  Thanks Chris!  Taking it one step at a time with the f=
ive digit number really helped me to see how to break it all up!  Are you a=
 teacher?  I appreciate the help and the patients!  I like that you don=E2=
=80=99t just give me the answer that you break it down and help me so that =
I can figure it out on my own!  Thanks to all of you for all of your help, =
you guys are helping me a lot and I really appreciate it!
>

Awesome!

No, I'm not a teacher by profession, but I was homeschooled, and since
I'm the second of seven children [1], I got used to teaching things to
my siblings. Also, every week I run a Dungeons and Dragons campaign
online, which requires similar skills. (Teaching maths is way easier
than getting my players to figure out some puzzles. I had no idea
that, in a group of half a dozen nerds, nobody would recognize this
broken text: "In brightest day, in blackest night / No evil ......
sight / Let .... worship .... mi.... / .... my power .... tern...." -
I'd have thought the first line alone would be enough for anyone who's
at least mildly nerdy and/or geeky.)

(We start in fifteen minutes. Want to come watch? Just telnet to
minstrelhall.com port 221!)

> Here is how I did it if you=E2=80=99re curious.=E2=80=A6.
>
> seconds =3D raw_input("Enter the number of seconds:")
> seconds =3D int(seconds)
> weeks =3D seconds/604800
> weeks_rem =3D seconds % 604800
> days =3D weeks_rem / 86400
> days_rem =3D seconds % 86400
> hours =3D days_rem / 3600
> hours_rem =3D seconds % 3600
> minutes =3D hours_rem / 60
> minutes_rem =3D seconds % 60
> seconds =3D minutes_rem % 60
>
> print weeks, 'weeks', days, 'days', hours, 'hours', minutes, 'minutes', s=
econds, 'seconds'
>
> Not sure if that=E2=80=99s the correct way to do it but it works!   If th=
ere is any other advice I=E2=80=99ll take it.

That's certainly effective. It's going to give you the right result. I
would be inclined to start from the small end and strip off the
seconds first, then the minutes, etc, because then you're working with
smaller divisors (60, 60, 24, 7 instead of 604800, 86400, 3600, 60);
most people will understand that a week is 7 days, but only people who
work with DNS will know that it's 604800 seconds. But both work.

You'll also note that you're trimming off bits and leaving "residual
seconds". I would put all the "_rem" values back into "seconds", which
would let you use augmented assignment:

weeks =3D seconds/604800
seconds %=3D 604800
days =3D seconds / 86400
seconds %=3D 86400
hours =3D seconds / 3600
seconds %=3D 3600
minutes =3D seconds / 60
seconds %=3D 60

This emphasizes that you're stripping components off and keeping the
number of remaining seconds for the next step. But that's pretty
minor. Main thing is, you know what you're doing; you have to not just
get the right answer, but know WHY you get that answer.

ChrisA

[1] Our father's not a captain, but there's still nothing about being
a non-captain with seven children. And that movie is definitely one of
our favorite things.