How to Define a 2-D (2-dimensional) List in Python
Introduction
A 2-D list or a two-dimensional list is a list of lists.
It typically represents a matrix with rows and columns.
In this article we will discuss various methods to create 2-D lists in Python.
Example of a 2-D list in python:
[ [1,2,3], [4,2,6], [5,8,7] ]
Methods to create a 2-D list in Python
There are only a few specific methods for creating a 2-D list. Let’s dive deeper into them:
Method 1: Using 2 for loops
for loops are one of the most important keyword in python.
We can use the mighty for loop to create a 2-D list but this time we have to use 2 for loops to create a 2-D list.
It is like creating two 1-D lists using for loop but in the nested pattern.
arr = []
c = 1
for i in range(3):
ar = []
for j in range(2):
ar.append(c)
c += 1
arr.append(ar)
print(arr)
Output:
[[1, 2], [3, 4], [5, 6]]
Method 2: Using List comprehension
Instead of using two for loops, we can create a 2-dimensional list in a more compact way, i.e. by using the list comprehension method.
Creating a list dynamically always consumes less memory and thereby increasing the runtime performance.
But again there are two ways of using the list comprehension method, let us look into both one by one:
In this we dynamically create a list of elements by directly multiplying with the number of columns and rows.
r, c = (4, 5)
arr = [[1]*c]*r
print(arr)
Output:
[[1, 1, 1, 1, 1], [1, 1, 1, 1, 1], [1, 1, 1, 1, 1], [1, 1, 1, 1, 1]]
Another way is to dynamically create a list of elements but by using for loops,
r, c = (5, 4)
arr = [[1 for i in range(c)] for j in range(r)]
print(arr)
Output:
[[1, 1, 1, 1], [1, 1, 1, 1], [1, 1, 1, 1], [1, 1, 1, 1], [1, 1, 1, 1]]
We have learnt three methods of initializing a 2-D list in python.
But which method is effective ?
Well , the third method is the most effective method of creating a 2-D list in python since it has both list comprehension with the mighty for loop.
Conclusion
In this article, we briefly discussed about the various methods that can be used to create a 2-D list in python and we also discussed about the most effective method for achieving this result.
I am Dibyanshu Mohanty, Undergraduate Engineering Student at VIT, Vellore with a keen interest in Web and App Development