For the loop
Python for loops are quite useful and nifty…
Something like this is great and easy to use:
for i in range(10):
add_business(name=fake.company())
However, understanding iteration is the key to mastering any programming language.
Let’s replace this with a corresponding while loop:
it = iter(range(10))
while True:
x = next(it)
add_business(name=fake.company())
At a glance, it seems like we’ve created an infinite loop - however, the design decision chosen
by Python creators involve having the next() call raise an exception, in order to specify that
the iteration is done.
Running the above code as is would add businesses as expected but would end in a StopIteration exception.
With Python, you get an exception within every single for-loop which is hidden away from the user.
In order to truly configure this as a for loop is designed, we’d have to re-write the code as following:
it = iter(range(10))
while True:
try:
x = next(it)
except StopIteration:
break
else:
add_business(name=fake.company())
So remember, every single time you use a for-loop like the one we began with in this post, the above is what is happening undercover 🕵️