Learn Python Easy Way Part 6 Copy Lists

Today lets is see how to copy a list. That means we can copy an entire list or a part of it as a separate list. But it has interesting features to it.

Let us create a list of names of cities

Cities = ['Mumbai', 'Pune', 'Nagpur']


Now I will copy this list to another. All I have to do is to use the assign operator and the name/s of the lists

Shallow Copy

Cities2 = Cities

This method is perhaps called as Shallow Copy. In this method the contents of the list Cities are referred to by a new variable Cities2. It is in fact the same list referred to by two different names.

This is all I have to do to create a copy of the list named Cities. We can verify it. Run the following code in a Python Shell

print(Cities)
['Mumbai', 'Pune', 'Nagpur']

print(Cities2)
['Mumbai', 'Pune', 'Nagpur']

Now the fun part, we will change something in the copy of our first list and see what happens. We will add another item in the list Cities2

Cities2.append('Kolkata')

Now let us print the content of our appended list Cities2

print(Cities2)

['Mumbai', 'Pune', 'Nagpur', 'Kolkata']

As we have only changed the copy and not have made any changes to the original, we would expect that the original list should be unaffected. Let us find that out. Let us print the contents of the original list.

print(Cities)

['Mumbai', 'Pune', 'Nagpur', 'Kolkata']

Notice the list, it has also changed. It seems that the two list names are dynamically linked together, if you make changes to one list, the other reflects those changes too. Let us try it on the first list and see what happens.

Cities.insert(3,'Singapore')

print(Cities)

['Mumbai', 'Pune', 'Nagpur', 'Singapore', 'Kolkata']

Let us check what has happened to the copy list Cities2

print(Cities2)

['Mumbai', 'Pune', 'Nagpur', 'Singapore', 'Kolkata']

Right, it has also changed. That is because we are looking at the same list by two different names.

Copy with Slice [:]

But of course that is not the only way to create a copy of a list in Python. We can also create a copy of list, entire list or a part of it by using Slice. Let us see how that works

Let me first create a new list

Cities = ['Mumbai','Bangalore','Delhi','Kolkata']

Now I will try to copy the entire list using [:] symbol

Cities2 = Cities[:]

When we print the contents of Cities2, it is confirmed

print(Cities2)

['Mumbai', 'Bangalore', 'Delhi', 'Kolkata']

Now let us remove one name from the copied list

Cities2.remove('Mumbai')

print(Cities2)

['Bangalore', 'Delhi', 'Kolkata']

Now let us check if that has changed anything in our original list

print(Cities)

['Mumbai', 'Bangalore', 'Delhi', 'Kolkata']

No it hasn't. Now lst us change something in the original list and see if that affects the copied list

Cities.append("Rangoon")

print(Cities)

['Mumbai', 'Bangalore', 'Delhi', 'Kolkata', 'Rangoon']

print(Cities2)

['Bangalore', 'Delhi', 'Kolkata']

As you can see, by making a copy of a list by using the Slicing method, you can copy the entire list. This way we get two independent lists which are unaffected by changes made to the other.

But Slice is not a method designed for copying Lists. Slice has its own uses. Therefore there must be another dedicated method for copying lists. And there is one. It is called deepcopy.

deepcopy

When we use assignment operator, the copy that is made is not really a copy, it just assigns a new name to the existing list. So we access the same list by two different names. But if we want to make a real copy, use deepcopy

from copy import deepcopy

We need to write the above sentence in the code/Python shell to use deepcopy method. Now we will test if the method works as promised

cities = ['Mumbai','Pune',['Vadnagar','Surat','Jamnagar'], 'Delhi']

cities2 = deepcopy(cities)

print(cities)

['Mumbai', 'Pune', ['Vadnagar', 'Surat', 'Jamnagar'], 'Delhi']

print(cities2)

['Mumbai', 'Pune', ['Vadnagar', 'Surat', 'Jamnagar'], 'Delhi']

cities2.insert(2,'Gujarat')

print(cities2)

['Mumbai', 'Pune', 'Gujarat', ['Vadnagar', 'Surat', 'Jamnagar'], 'Delhi']

print(cities)

['Mumbai', 'Pune', ['Vadnagar', 'Surat', 'Jamnagar'], 'Delhi']

cities.remove(['Vadnagar', 'Surat', 'Jamnagar'])

print(cities)

['Mumbai', 'Pune', 'Delhi']

print(cities2)

['Mumbai', 'Pune', 'Gujarat', ['Vadnagar', 'Surat', 'Jamnagar'], 'Delhi']

From the above example it becomes clear that deepcopy method creates a real copy of the object, list that is which is separate/ independent from the original object. deepcopy is also used for copying compound objects and nested lists