Instruction
Great! In Python, you can also use tuples to pass a varying number of arguments to a function. Consider the following example:
def average_value(*args):
if len(args) == 0:
return 0.0
sum = 0.0
count = 0
for arg in args:
sum += arg
count += 1
return sum/count
The parameter in the average_value() function definition is *args. The asterisk sign (*) before the variable name means any number of arguments. Technically, this is a tuple, which means we can use the len() function or a for loop inside the method body.
The average_value() function can now take any number of arguments and return their average. This means that the function will work with any of these invocations:
average_value(1) # 1.0 average_value(1, 2, 3) # 2.0 average_value(34, 89, 243, 982, 9) # 271.4
Exercise
Write a function named min_max_difference. The function should accept any number of arguments and return the difference between the greatest and smallest numbers. If zero or one argument is passed, return 0.
Stuck? Here's a hint!
Inside the function, define two variables: min and max. Initially, both of them should equal args[0]. Then, check each item in args and see if it's greater than max or less than min; update the max or min values accordingly.
