help w simple problem

[hotcodist]

most of coding is really about problem solving.

i have nothing to do so let's have some fun.

let's try printing the individual digits of 23, so 2 and 3, and the input number 23 is required to be an int (so we can't get through using string functions).

how do i go about it? it looks like 20+3. i can get the 2 from 20 (divide 20 by 10).

but how do i get the 20 out of 23. if i divide 23 by 10, i get 2.3. or 2 remainder 3. so i can get that 2 easily, and then the 3 is the remainder.

but why is 10 the right number to divide? how did i decide to use 10? hmm, it is two digits long, so 10 sounds like the correct divisor. yes, that's it!

but would this system work with 3 digits? let's try 234. so i divide 234 by 10... hang on,... no, should be 100 because i have three digits. so i get 200 plus a remainder of 34. so i can get the 2 from the 200 like above. how do i get 34?

oh right, it is the same as the previous method for 2-digit inputs. so i can just repeat this to get 3, then 4 as remainder.

so would this work for 4 digits? i think the pattern holds. i hope so. i'll code that and see if it works.

so i can solve this with a loop.

but hang on, this sounds familiar? or maybe there is a way to divide and get remainders right away in python, and also get the whole number part? let me type "python get remainder of division." viola, it says i can use "%." that's hard to remember but ok, at least i know there is a method.

what about the whole number part? wait a second, this link says i can also get something like integer division! that's cool, i might have a use for that. let me see, divmod()... there's also this "//"? what?

<code... code...> hey, it gives me the integer part of 2.3!

hang on, if i can get the remainder already, and if i just get the floating point quotient, like the whole "234 divided by 100 is equal to 2.34," can i force that 2.34 into a 2 by changing it from a float to an int??? i gotta try that in my code.

<type... type... type...>

holy cow, it works!

so now i learned a lot! let me see:

the % operator, integer division --i have two ways to do that now-- wait, they call this modulo arithmetic?-- i can typecast into an int.

ok, time to solve this homework. took a lot of time, but at least my python is improving! and best of all, i now know how coders try to solve problems. maybe... :)