On this page: slice indexing with [:], negative indexing, slice and negative indexing on strings.
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Video Summary
Different parts of myList were printed out in this script. The shell session includes the script outputs and some interactive portion.
It's possible to "slice" a list in Python. This will return a specific segment of a given list. For example, the command myList[2] will return the 3rd item in your list (remember that Python begins counting with the number 0).
You can expand the length and change the location of the list segment returned using a colon in your command. Ex: myList[2:5] will return the 3rd through 5th items in your list. Typing myList[:5] will return every item up to the 5th item on a list, while myList[2:] on the other hand, with a colon following the numeral, will return every item starting with the 3rd.
Python can also return a segment of a list counting from the end. This is done simply by inserting a negative before the desired numerals within the slice command. Ex: myList[-5] will return your fifth from last entry.
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As in the previous tutorial, the same negative indexing and slicing mechanism extend to strings. Below, various substrings in the string 'python' are returned.
>>> w = 'python'>>> w[-1] # first character from the end'n'>>> w[-2] # second character from the end'o'>>> w[1:3]
'yt'>>> w[2:5]
'tho'>>> w[:5] # slice from the beginning'pytho'>>> w[2:] # slice until the end'thon'>>> w[-3]
'h'>>> w[-3:] # negative index can also be used in slicing'hon'