CC 1.5

compressedString.py

# cc1.5 Implement a method to perform string compression using counts of repeated characters. If the compressed string is not smaller than the ooriginal string, return the original one.


def compression(s):
    
    list1 = list(s)
    list2 = []
    c = 1
    j = 0
    for i in range(1, len(list1)):
                   
        if  list1[i] == list1[j]:
            c += 1
        else:
            list2.append(list1[j])
            list2.append(str(c))
            c = 1
            j = i
    #to append the last char in string 
    list2.append(list1[j])
    list2.append(str(c))
   

    cmpstring = ''.join(list2)
    
    if len(cmpstring) >= len(s):
        cmpstring = s

    return cmpstring


s = raw_input('Input a string:')
print compression(s)

Please try some test cases e.g. "" and "abbcdddddd"