Question

I have a file that i’m reading in, then creating nested lists that i want to then sort on the 4 element(zipcode)

jk43:23 Marfield Lane:Plainview:NY:10023
axe99:315 W. 115th Street, Apt. 11B:New York:NY:10027
jab44:23 Rivington Street, Apt. 3R:New York:NY:10002
ap172:19 Boxer Rd.:New York:NY:10005
jb23:115 Karas Dr.:Jersey City:NJ:07127
jb29:119 Xylon Dr.:Jersey City:NJ:07127
ak9:234 Main Street:Philadelphia:PA:08990

Here is my code:

ex3_3 = open('ex1.txt')
exw = open('ex2_sorted.txt', 'w')

data = []
for line in ex3_3:
    items = line.rstrip().split(':')
    data.append(items)
print sorted(data, key=operator.itemgetter(4))

Output:

[['jb23', '115 Karas Dr.', 'Jersey City', 'NJ', '07127'], ['jb29', '119 Xylon Dr.', 'Jersey City', 'NJ', '07127'], ['ak9', '234 Main Street', 'Philadelphia', 'PA', '08990'], ['jab44', '23 Rivington Street, Apt. 3R', 'New York', 'NY', '10002'], ['ap172', '19 Boxer Rd.', 'New York', 'NY', '10005'], ['jk43', '23 Marfield Lane', 'Plainview', 'NY', '10023'], ['axe99', '315 W. 115th Street, Apt. 11B', 'New York', 'NY', '10027']]

this all works fine, I just wonder if there is a way to do this without using “import operator”?

Answer 1

Oh yes, there is a way:

print sorted(data,key=lambda x: x[4])