User Input

User Input is a way for a program to receive data from the user while the program is running. In Python, we can use the built-in input() function to get input from the user.

To use the input() function, we simply call it and optionally pass a string as a prompt to display to the user.

Let’s ask the user for their name and then greet them:

name = input("What is your name? ")
print("Hello, " + name + "!")

Here’s how this code works:

1. We call the input() function with the prompt "What is your name? "
2. The program waits for the user to type their name and press Enter.
3. The user’s input is then stored in the variable name as the input function always returns the entered string.
4. Finally, we print a greeting message that includes the user’s name.

You can use the input() function to get different types of input from the user as well by using type conversion.

For example, if you want to get a number from the user, you can convert the input string to an integer using the int() function:

ageString = (input("How old are you? ")) # use the input function to get user input and store in ageString variable
age = int(ageString) # convert our ageString variable that is string type to integer type
print("You are " + str(age) + " years old.") # print the message to the user - converting age back to string for concatenation

If you want to read more about type conversion, check out the Type Conversion page.