Available in the standard library as defaultdict
from collections import defaultdict
d = defaultdict(int)
d['key'] # 0
d['key'] = 5
d['key'] # 5
d = defaultdict(lambda: 'empty')
d['key'] # 'empty'
d['key'] = 'full'
d['key'] # 'full'
[*] Alternatively, if you must use the built-in dict
class, using dict.setdefault()
will allow you to create a default whenever you access a key that did not exist before:
>>> d = {}
{}
>>> d.setdefault('Another_key', []).append("This worked!")
>>> d
{'Another_key': ['This worked!']}
Keep in mind that if you have many values to add, dict.setdefault()
will create a new instance of the initial value (in this example a []
) every time it's called - which may create unnecessary workloads.
[*] Python Cookbook, 3rd edition, by David Beazley and Brian K. Jones (O’Reilly). Copyright 2013 David Beazley and Brian Jones, 978-1-449-34037-7.