How to avoid using global variables?

Carl Published at Dev

Carl

I use global variables but I've read that they aren't a good practice or pythonic. I often use functions that give as a result many yes/no variables that I need to use in the main function. For example, how can I write the following code without using global variables?

def secondary_function():
    global alfa_is_higher_than_12
    global beta_is_higher_than_12

    alfa = 12
    beta = 5

    if alfa > 10:
        alfa_is_higher_than_12 = "yes"
    else:
        alfa_is_higher_than_12 = "no"

    if beta > 10:
        beta_is_higher_than_12 = "yes"
    else:
        beta_is_higher_than_12 = "no"

def main_function():
    global alfa_is_higher_than_12
    global beta_is_higher_than_12

    secondary_function()

    if alfa_is_higher_than_12=="yes":
        print("alfa is higher than 12")
    else:
        print("alfa isn't higher than 12")

    if beta_is_higher_than_12=="yes":
        print("beta is higher than 12")
    else:
        print("beta isn't higher thant 12")

main_function()

sjc

One could ask what reasons you might have to structure your code like this, but assuming you have your reasons, you could just return the values from your secondary function:

def secondary_function():

  alfa = 12
  beta = 5

  if alfa > 10:
      alfa_is_higher_than_12 = "yes"
  else:
      alfa_is_higher_than_12 = "no"

  if beta > 10:
      beta_is_higher_than_12 = "yes"
  else:
      beta_is_higher_than_12 = "no"

  return alfa_is_higher_than_12, beta_is_higher_than_12


def main_function():

  alfa_is_higher_than_12, beta_is_higher_than_12 = secondary_function()

  if alfa_is_higher_than_12=="yes":
      print("alfa is higher than 12")
  else:
      print("alfa isn't higher than 12")

  if beta_is_higher_than_12=="yes":
      print("beta is higher than 12")
  else:
      print("beta isn't higher thant 12")

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