So I have decided I will embrace some of my, sometimes, let's call them "less practical ideas". Therefore, I will do this as a series, Don't try this at work or DTTAW for short. My previous and first post of the series was:
Don't Try This at Work: Exception Driven Fizz Buzz
Fredrik Sjöstrand ・ Jun 27 '20 ・ 3 min read
However, I figured I would take on the challenge of removing all if-statements from the code. This was surprisingly easy. The solution:
import sys
import inspect
import traceback
def fizzbuzz(val):
assert val % 15 != 0
fizz(val)
def fizz(val):
assert val % 3 != 0
buzz(val)
def buzz(val):
assert val % 5 != 0
def exception_driven_fizzbuzz(val):
try:
fizzbuzz(val)
print(val)
except AssertionError as e:
tb = e.__traceback__
while tb.tb_next:
tb = tb.tb_next
print(tb.tb_frame.f_code.co_name)
for val in range(1, 16):
exception_driven_fizzbuzz(val)
The only difference from last time is that we have swapped the if-statements for assert-statements. In doing so we had to flip the logic checks. Instead of detecting that value is divisible by 3 for the fizz function we assert that it is not divisible by 3. Then if it is divisible by 3 an AssertionError
is raised. As we are using AssertionError
instead of ValueErrors
we also had to modify the error type in the except-statement, but that is it!
Small caveat here, the change from if-statement to asserts actually introduces a bug. This bug is triggered only if you run the script using the -O
flag: python -O fizzbuzz_v2.py
. If you do, it will just print the numbers instead. The reason is that the -O
flag runs the script with optimizations, which includes removing all assert-statements. No assert-statements gives no errors and results in no fizzbuzzing.
I hope this post was entertaining and can inspire you to try some unorthodox coding practices (at home of course). It is a fun way to explore the language where you might find some interesting and actually useful insights.
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