Assigning function to variable in Python

Question

I have a function that returns a tuple.

    def x():
        ...
        return (a, b, c, d)
    var = x()
    print (var[1], var[2])

In this case, is the function called each time I use one of the tuple objects? My hopes are that the function is only called once, at the time of the assignment to variable.

Sorry for the newbie question.

Answer 1

No, your function is only called once. Likewise, your tuple is only created once, that is at the call var = x() .

var[2] simply accesses the already existing tuple`s entry at a particular position, here third position (counting starts at 0).

Answer 2

The function is executed only once, when you call it, specifically in this line:

var = x()

In your next line, you are just working with the var variable that function output was assigned to.