Tricks with Zip in Python

Python-Zip-tricks.py

## Tuple: 
# Capture arbitrarily long list
values = 1,2,3,4,5
a, b, *rest = values
# Discard the rest
a, b, *_ = values

## Zip: 
# "pairs" up the elements of list
seq1 = ['foo','bar','baz']
seq2 = ['one','two','three']

for i in list(zip(seq1, seq2)):
    a,b = i
    print('{}-{}'.format(b,a))

# Unzip a sequence
pitchers = [('Nolan','Ryan'),
            ('Roger','Clemens'),
            ('Schilling','Curt')]

first_names, last_name = zip(*pitchers)

# Create Dicts from Sequences
mapping = {}
key_list = ['Apple','Orange','Banana']
value_list = [1, 4, 8]
for key, value in zip(key_list, value_list):
    mapping[key] = value