How to convert a list within a list to string in Python

Question

I have a JSON output and I am appending each element into a python list using a for loop. I am using the append function to add element to my list. Once the loop is completed I want to convert each item in the list into a string. The problem is there each element in the list is another list. So there are for example 2 lists inside one main list. I have tried to exhaust possiblilities of converting the list into strings using the code below.

I have tried using :

• print '\n'.join(map(str, folder_concat))
• print '\n'.join(str(x) for x in folder_concat)

I also tried to convert the appended list before appending by using:

''.join(map(str, my_string.append(...elements to append...)

but, the output is always the same unicode format in the typical list style as follows:

(u'190430', u'TEST', u'Executing', False, False, u'20190430000522', u'20190430000522', u'20190506141820')
(u'190430', u'TEST1', u'Executing', False, False, u'20190430000522', u'20190430000522', u'20190506141820')

To add to the request some of the elements that are populated in the append are lists as well for example estimatedStartTime and this can be fetched with empty data so I cant iterate over it using (str(x) for x in folder_concat) as it will fail with the Iterable Error.

Here is the script I am using:

#!/usr/bin/python

import json
import sys

json_string = sys.stdin.read()
json_data = json.loads(json_string)

returned = json_data['returned']

if returned > 0:
    locations = json_data['statuses']
    sess_count = 0
    folder_count = 0
    folder_concat = []
    folder_str = []

    for i in locations:
        if i['type'] == 'Folder':
            folder_count += 1
            folder_concat.append((
                i.get('orderDate', ''),
                i.get('folderId', ''),
                i.get('status', ''),
                i.get('held', ''),
                i.get('deleted', ''),
                i.get('startTime', ''),
                (''.join(i.get('estimatedStartTime', ''
                 )[0]) if 'estimatedStartTime'
                 in i else ''.join(i.get('estimatedStartTime', ''))),
                (''.join(i.get('estimatedEndTime', ''
                 )[0]) if 'estimatedEndTime'
                 in i else ''.join(i.get('estimatedEndTime', ''))),
                ))
        else:
            pass
       print '\n'.join(str(x) for x in folder_concat)
elif odata['returned'] == 0:
    print 'No results fetched.'
else:
   pass

The input file is:

{
  "statuses" : [ {
    "orderDate" : "190430",
    "folderId" : "TEST",
    "status" : "Executing",
    "held" : false,
    "deleted" : false,
    "startTime" : "20190501000551",
    "estimatedStartTime" : [ "20190501000551" ],
    "estimatedEndTime" : [ "20190505043236" ],
  } ,{
    "orderDate" : "190430",
    "folderId" : "TEST1",
    "status" : "Executing",
    "held" : false,
    "deleted" : false,
    "startTime" : "20190501000551",
    "estimatedStartTime" : [ "20190501000551" ],
    "estimatedEndTime" : [ "20190505043236" ],
  }],
  "returned" : 2,
  "total" : 2
}

The results should look like:

190430, TEST, Executing, False, False, 20190430000522, 20190430000522, 20190506141820
190430, TEST1, Executing, False, False, 20190430000522, 20190430000522, 20190506141820

Answer 1

First, when you do str on a tuple, it will print exactly the tuple, so with the parenthesis.

I would change the folder output by something like this:

for i in locations:
    folder_count += 1
    content = [
        i.get('orderDate', ''),
        i.get('folderId', ''),
        i.get('status', ''),
        i.get('held', ''),
        i.get('deleted', ''),
        i.get('startTime', ''),
        (''.join(i.get('estimatedStartTime', ''
         )[0]) if 'estimatedStartTime'
         in i else ''.join(i.get('estimatedStartTime', ''))),
        (''.join(i.get('estimatedEndTime', ''
         )[0]) if 'estimatedEndTime'
         in i else ''.join(i.get('estimatedEndTime', ''))),
    ]
    folder_concat.append(', '.join(str(item) for item in content))
    print '\n'.join(str(x) for x in folder_concat)

This way, you have a first step in order to transform your element as the wanted string, and then you keep the same flow. Let me know if you have any question.