Lists & loops
Iterate, transform, and combine sequences with readable loop patterns.
Find Minimum Value in a List in Python
This code defines a function that finds and returns the minimum value in a list of numbers, handling empty lists gracefully by returning None.
def find_minimum(numbers):
"""
Find and return the minimum value in a list of numbers.
Args:
numbers: List of numeric values
Returns:
The minimum value, or None if the list is empty
"""
if not numbers:
return None
min_value = numbers[0]
for num in n…How to Build a Running Maximum List in Python
Compute a list where each element is the maximum of all numbers seen so far from an input list.
def running_maximum(numbers):
result = []
current_max = float('-inf')
for num in numbers:
if num > current_max:
current_max = num
result.append(current_max)
return result
if __name__ == "__main__":
numbers = [3, 1, 4, 1, 5, 9, 2, 6]
max_list = running_maximum(number…How to Find the Third Smallest Element in a Python List
Find the third smallest distinct value in a Python list by sorting unique elements and returning the third index.
def find_third_smallest(numbers):
if len(numbers) < 3:
return None
unique_sorted = sorted(set(numbers))
if len(unique_sorted) < 3:
return None
return unique_sorted[2]
if __name__ == "__main__":
sample = [5, 2, 8, 2, 9, 1, 7, 3]
result = find_third_smallest(sampl…Browse by section
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Lists & loops — Python code examples
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This page collects lists & loops snippets — short, copy-ready Python you can paste into our free online IDE and run without installing anything. Each sample includes a plain-English explanation and the full source code.
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