Create an empty list in python with certain size

Question

I want to create an empty list (or whatever is the best way) that can hold 10 elements.

After that I want to assign values in that list, for example this is supposed to display 0 to 9:

s1 = list();
for i in range(0,9):
   s1[i] = i

print  s1

But when I run this code, it generates an error or in another case it just displays [] (empty).

Can someone explain why?

Answer 1

s1 = []
for i in range(11):
   s1.append(i)

print s1

To create a list, just use these brackets: "[]"

To add something to a list, use list.append()

Answer 2

There are two "quick" methods:

x = length_of_your_list
a = [None]*x
# or
a = [None for _ in xrange(x)]

It appears that [None]*x is faster:

>>> from timeit import timeit
>>> timeit("[None]*100",number=10000)
0.023542165756225586
>>> timeit("[None for _ in xrange(100)]",number=10000)
0.07616496086120605

But if you are ok with a range (e.g. [0,1,2,3,...,x-1]), then range(x) might be fastest:

>>> timeit("range(100)",number=10000)
0.012513160705566406