So I'm wondering what the most "pythonic" way of turning a list into a string.
For example:
string_list = ['h', 'e', 'l', 'l', 'o']
# to the string
string = 'hello'
I've been using the ''.join(string_list) method but it just feels near unreadable and roundabout method to do something so simple.
Is there a better way or am I overcomplicating this?
No, that is the pythonic way to do it.
Maybe you feel that it should read: string_list.join(''). You are not alone.
Probably the most important advantage is, that this enables .join() to work with anything that is iterable.
If it worked the other way around, each collection would need to implement a join() method by themselves. If you were to create your own collection, would you add a .join() method? Probably not.
The fact that it is a method of the str class means, that it will always work. There are no surprises. Read here on Python and the principle of least astonishment about join() and other things by the Flask author Armin Ronacher.
A similar argument can be made for the len() function/operator, which can be found at the beginning of the aforementioned article.
Use ''.join(string_list). Note that list names a built-in type, so you should not use that for variable names. Since Python strings are immutable, you need to construct a new string regardless. ''.join(s) is the canonical and efficient way to do this in Python.
''.join(s) is like writing s[0]+''+s[1]+''+s[2]+''+s[3]...s[x] ?
+ method creates n temporary copies. The str.join method reserves required space in a single pre-pass. So the .join method will outperform the naive + operator for non-trivial cases, especially those cases where there are many strings to join
.join() string method is actually the most efficient method of assembling a multipart string in Python. String addition is slow because it creates many strings: first it creates s[0]+'', then to that resulting string it adds s[1] to create another. .join() only creates a single string.n new strings still need to be created, with all but the last being temporary, due to the simple way the + operator overload is expanded and handled in the AST
Py_MEMCPY(p, sep, seplen); will do a memcpy on a seplen of 0 in the case of ''.join, so nothing will actually end up being copied.I think you're overcomplicating. Here is from python itself:
>>> list = ['h', 'e', 'l', 'l', 'o']
>>> sum(list, '')
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>
TypeError: sum() can't sum strings [use ''.join(seq) instead]
So, python's recommendation is to use ''.join.
''.join(list)is a very pythonic way already, are you looking for a better efficiency?list, you are shadowing the builtin.