Tuples

What is a Tuple?

A tuple is an immutable list. It's a list that cannot be changed once its defined. Tuples can be used to store data that isn't meant to be altered such as menu options in a game or the constant for acceleration due to gravity affecting all projectiles in your game.

Fortunately, most of the ideas that we learned from lists carry over - just not the methods and functions that added and deleted elements since tuples are immutable.

Declaring a Tuple

Declaring a tuple is as the same as a list with the exception that you use parenthesis to enclose the elements rather than square brackets.

          acceleration = (0,-9.81)
          print(acceleration[0])
          print(acceleration[1])
        

          0
          -9.81
        

Modifying a Tuple

If we try to modify any of the elements in a tuple, you will get the error TypeError: 'tuple' object does not support item assignment.. This is the expected behavior and if you find yourself in needing to modify a tuple often - you should consider using a list instead.

          TypeError: 'tuple' object does not support item assignment
        

Looping Through Tuples

You can loop through every element in a tuple just like you did with lists.

          0
          -9.81