Python: functions: Keyword arguments

Functions can also be called using keyword arguments, i.e, by using argument names.

def printEmployee(id, firstName, lastName, designation='Engineer'):

         print(id, firstName, lastName, designation)

Above function can be called in following ways.

printEmployee(id=1, lastName='Gurram', firstName='Hari')

printEmployee(lastName='Krishna', firstName='Rama', id=2)

printEmployee(designation='Tech Lead', lastName='Battu', firstName='Gopi', id=3)

test.py

def printEmployee(id, firstName, lastName, designation='Engineer'):
 print(id, firstName, lastName, designation)
 
printEmployee(id=1, lastName='Gurram', firstName='Hari')
printEmployee(lastName='Krishna', firstName='Rama', id=2)
printEmployee(designation='Tech Lead', lastName='Battu', firstName='Gopi', id=3)

$ python3 test.py

1 Hari Gurram Engineer

2 Rama Krishna Engineer

3 Gopi Battu Tech Lead

Note:

a.   Keyword arguments must follow positional arguments.

def printEmployee(id, firstName, lastName, designation='Engineer'):

         print(id, firstName, lastName, designation)

        

printEmployee(1, lastName='Gurram', firstName='Hari', "engineer")

When you tries to compile above file, you will get following error.

$ python3 test.py

  File "test.py", line 4

    printEmployee(1, lastName='Gurram', firstName='Hari', "engineer")

                                                         ^

SyntaxError: positional argument follows keyword argument

Previous                                                 Next                                                 Home