Python Numbers
Numbers in Python can be of 3 types: int
, float
and complex
.
Integer numbers
Integer numbers are represented using the int
class. You can define an integer using a value literal:
age = 8
You can also define an integer number using the int()
constructor:
age = int(8)
To check if a variable is of type int
, you can use the type()
global function:
type(age) == int #True
Floating point numbers
Floating point numbers (fractions) are of type float
. You can define an integer using a value literal:
fraction = 0.1
Or using the float()
constructor:
fraction = float(0.1)
To check if a variable is of type float
, you can use the type()
global function:
type(fraction) == float #True
Complex numbers
Complex numbers are of type complex
.
You can define them using a value literal:
complexNumber = 2+3j
or using the complex()
constructor:
complexNumber = complex(2, 3)
Once you have a complex number, you can get its real and imaginary part:
complexNumber.real #2.0
complexNumber.imag #3.0
Again, to check if a variable is of type complex
, you can use the type()
global function:
type(complexNumber) == complex #True
Arithmetic operations on numbers
You can perform arithmetic operations on numbers, using the arithmetic operators: +
, -
, *
, /
(division), %
(remainder), **
(exponentiation) and //
(floor division):
1 + 1 #2
2 - 1 #1
2 * 2 #4
4 / 2 #2
4 % 3 #1
4 ** 2 #16
4 // 2 #2
and you can use the compound assignment operators
+=
-=
*=
/=
%=
- ..and so on
to quickly perform operations on variables, too:
age = 8
age += 1
Built-in Functions
There are 2 built-in functions that help with numbers:
abs()
returns the absolute value of a number.
round()
given a number, returns its value rounded to the nearest integer:
round(0.12) #0
You can specify a second parameter to set the decimal points precision:
round(0.12, 1) #0.1
Several other math utility functions and constants are provided by the Python standard library:
- the
math
package provides general math functions and constants - the
cmath
package provides utilities to work with complex numbers. - the
decimal
package provides utilities to work with decimals and floating point numbers. - the
fractions
package provides utilities to work with rational numbers
We’ll explore some of those separately later on.
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