tolist#

tolist(obj=None, objtype=None, keepnone=False, coerce='default')[source]#

Make sure object is always a list (note: sc.tolist()/sc.promotetolist() are identical).

Used so functions can handle inputs like 'a' or ['a', 'b']. In other words, if an argument can either be a single thing (e.g., a single dict key) or a list (e.g., a list of dict keys), this function can be used to do the conversion, so it’s always safe to iterate over the output.

While this usually wraps objects in a list rather than converts them to a list, the “coerce” argument can be used to change this behavior. Options are:

  • ‘none’ or None: do not coerce

  • ‘default’: coerce objects that were lists in Python 2 (range, map, dict_keys, dict_values, dict_items)

  • ‘tuple’: all the types in default, plus tuples

  • ‘full’: all the types in default, plus tuples and arrays

Parameters:

  • obj (anything) – object to ensure is a list

  • objtype (anything) – optional type to check for each element; see sc.checktype() for details

  • keepnone (bool) – if keepnone is false, then None is converted to []; else, it’s converted to [None]

  • coerce (str/tuple) – tuple of additional types to coerce to a list (as opposed to wrapping in a list)

See also sc.mergelists() to handle multiple input arguments.

Examples:

sc.tolist(5) # Returns [5]
sc.tolist(np.array([3,5])) # Returns [np.array([3,5])] -- not [3,5]!
sc.tolist(np.array([3,5]), coerce=np.ndarray) # Returns [3,5], since arrays are coerced to lists
sc.tolist(None) # Returns []
sc.tolist(range(3)) # Returns [0,1,2] since range is coerced by default
sc.tolist(['a', 'b', 'c'], objtype='number') # Raises exception

def myfunc(data, keys):
    keys = sc.tolist(keys)
    for key in keys:
        print(data[key])

data = {'a':[1,2,3], 'b':[4,5,6]}
myfunc(data, keys=['a', 'b']) # Works
myfunc(data, keys='a') # Still works, equivalent to needing to supply keys=['a'] without tolist()
New in version 1.1.0: “coerce” argument
New in version 1.2.2: default coerce values
New in version 2.0.2: tuple coersion
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