Python - Proper syntax for 1 line if-else satement

Question

To preface this, I'm very new to programming so bear with me.

I'm having issues with the syntax for a function I'm writing where I want it to check for duplicate values within a textfile that's been imported and sorted. I want to do this with the following code:

def kollaDublett(dataList):
 c = Counter(dataList)
 result = [x for x, v in c.items() if v > 1]

dataList is the list I'm checking for duplicates, and I'd like to somehow embedd an if-else to return either a True or False where result is defined. The instructor for this assignment said it was possible to do in a single line but she couldn't really make it work since she doesn't have that much experience in Python.

I can return result and print its value and it'll show the duplicate, but as I mentioned I would like it to check if there's a duplicate then depending on that returning either a True or False.

Thanks in advance!

Answer 1

Specific to your problem, using any , you could write:

def kollaDublett(dataList):
    c = Counter(dataList)
    return any((x for x,v in c.items() if v > 1))

Generally answering your title question about "1 line if-else statement", you might want to look into ternary operator .

Answer 2

If you want only a True/False list, you can use a list comprehension:

def kollaDublett(dataList):
    c = Counter(dataList)
    result = [True  if v > 1 else False for x, v in c.items()]
    return result

Instead, to return a dictionary (expression:duplicate or not):

 def kollaDublett(dataList):
     c = Counter(dataList)
     result = {x:(True  if v > 1 else False) for x, v in c.items()}
     return result