Question

I am learning the use of functions in python and want to know if it is possible to return more than 1 value.

Answer 1

Python has some parameter unpacking which is cool. So although you can only return one value, if it is a tuple, you can unpack it automatically:

>>> def foo():
...     return 1, 2, 3, 4 # Returns a tuple
>>> foo()
(1, 2, 3, 4)

>>> a, b, c, d = foo()
>>> a
1
>>> b
2
>>> c
3
>>> d
4

In Python 3 you have more advanced features:

>>> a, *b = foo()
>>> a
1
>>> b
[2, 3, 4]
>>> *a, b = foo()
>>> a
[1, 2, 3]
>>> b
4
>>> a, *b, c = foo()
>>> a
1
>>> b
[2, 3]
>>> c
4

But that doesn’t work in Python 2.