Introduction

In the previous chapter, you learned the basics of the Python programming language and essential elements such as string, int, and the use of conditionals and loops that control the flow of a Python program. You should now be familiar with writing programs in Python by utilizing these elements.

In this chapter, you are going to look at how to use data structures to store more complex types of data that help to model the actual data and represent it in the real world.

In programming languages, data structures refer to objects that can hold some data together, which means they are used to store a collection of related data.

For instance, you can use a list to store our to-do items for the day. The following is an example to show you how lists are coded:

todo = ["pick up laundry", "buy Groceries", "pay electric bills"]

We can also use a dictionary object to store more complex information such as subscribers' details from our mailing list. Here is an example code snippet, but don't worry, we will cover this later in this chapter:

User = {

  "first_name": "Jack",

  "last_name":"White",

  "age": 41,

  "email": "jack.white@gmail.com"

}

There are four types of data structures in Python: list, tuple, dictionary, and set.

Figure 2.1: The different data structures in Python

These data structures define the relationship between data and the operations that can be performed on data. They are a way of organizing and storing data that can be accessed efficiently under different circumstances.