Python - Store strings from text file into a variable

Question

I'm wanting a script that will store the first word from each line from an input file into a variable.

Current code only stores the last name.

def func(file): 
  global user 
  with open(file) as iFile: 
    for line in iFile: 
    string = line.split(',') 
    user = string[0]

func(sys.argv[1]) 
print user

The text file input is:

string1,string2,string3
string1,string2,string3
string1,string2,string3

I want the variable user to store the all of the string1's on each line from the text file.

Answer 1

Indenting issue.

This will fix it. I also changed your func, so that you no longer use a global but instead return a generator with the users from the list.

This is a better practise and more memory efficient.

def func(file): 
  with open(file) as iFile: 
    for line in iFile: 
        string = line.split(',') 
        yield string[0]

for user in func(sys.argv[1]) 
    print user

Answer 2

i recommend this

def func(path):
    with open(path) as _file:
        return [s.split(',')[0] for s in _file]

user = func(sys.argv[1])
print user

Answer 3

I would go for this :

user = []
def func(file): 
  with open(file) as iFile: 
    for line in iFile: 
      user.append(line.split(',')[0])

func(sys.argv[1]) 
print user

It stores in a list all "first string" of every line you will provide to the function. By the way the solution of Matt PsyK is totally more efficient!