Python Forum

I'm new to python so I need a bit of direction. I've got some python code given to me to run against some quite complicated json files. I followed directions but cannot get the code to work correctly so I'm obviously missing something. I have decades of programming experience but not in this new environment. I used fortran, cobol, pascal etc. Things a bit different now. SO anyway I downloaded python 3.8.2 onto my pc. Loaded the python script and json file into the same path. Normally when runnign code I'd like to see a debug of what the code is doing. How do I turn that on? I cannot tell where python is trying to read from. Here's the script. It seems you need a wildcard to input NAME. Not sure where to do this. I open idle, do file new, paste in the script and save then do run module. But no output. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Listing from debug at end. As I said I'm new to python so the errors have little meaning to me. Thanks.

import json



def findfraud(NAME):
    with open(NAME + '.json', encoding="utf8") as f:
        x = json.load(f)
    TotalVotesLost = 0
    for i in range(len(x["data"]["races"][0]["timeseries"])):
        if i != 0 and x["data"]["races"][0]["timeseries"][i]["votes"] * x["data"]["races"][0]["timeseries"][i]["vote_shares"]["trumpd"] < x["data"]["races"][0]["timeseries"][i-1]["votes"] * x["data"]["races"][0]["timeseries"][i-1]["vote_shares"]["trumpd"]:
            if x["data"]["races"][0]["timeseries"][i]["votes"] * x["data"]["races"][0]["timeseries"][i]["vote_shares"]["bidenj"] > x["data"]["races"][0]["timeseries"][i-1]["votes"] * x["data"]["races"][0]["timeseries"][i-1]["vote_shares"]["bidenj"]:
                print ("Index : " + str(i) + " Past Index : " + str(i-1))
                print (x["data"]["races"][0]["timeseries"][i]["votes"] * x["data"]["races"][0]["timeseries"][i]["vote_shares"]["trumpd"] - x["data"]["races"][0]["timeseries"][i-1]["votes"] * x["data"]["races"][0]["timeseries"][i-1]["vote_shares"]["trumpd"])
                TotalVotesLost += x["data"]["races"][0]["timeseries"][i]["votes"] * x["data"]["races"][0]["timeseries"][i]["vote_shares"]["trumpd"] - x["data"]["races"][0]["timeseries"][i-1]["votes"] * x["data"]["races"][0]["timeseries"][i-1]["vote_shares"]["trumpd"]
    print (str(str(TotalVotesLost)  + " Flo"))

def findfraud2(NAME):
    with open(NAME + '.json', encoding="utf8") as f:
        x = json.load(f)
    TotalVotesLost = 0
    for i in range(len(x["data"]["races"][0]["timeseries"])):
        if i != 0 and x["data"]["races"][0]["timeseries"][i]["votes"] < x["data"]["races"][0]["timeseries"][i-1]["votes"]:
            TotalVotesLost += x["data"]["races"][0]["timeseries"][i]["votes"] - x["data"]["races"][0]["timeseries"][i-1]["votes"]
    print (TotalVotesLost)

[DEBUG ON]
>>>
= RESTART: C:/Users/Paul/AppData/Local/Programs/Python/Python38-32/findfraud.py
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "C:/Users/Paul/AppData/Local/Programs/Python/Python38-32/findfraud.py", line 1, in <module>
import json
File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 988, in _find_and_load
File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 148, in __enter__
File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 174, in _get_module_lock
File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 59, in __init__
File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 59, in __init__
File "C:\Users\Paul\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python38-32\lib\bdb.py", line 88, in trace_dispatch
return self.dispatch_line(frame)
File "C:\Users\Paul\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python38-32\lib\bdb.py", line 112, in dispatch_line
self.user_line(frame)
File "C:\Users\Paul\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python38-32\lib\idlelib\debugger.py", line 24, in user_line
self.gui.interaction(message, frame)
AttributeError: '_ModuleLock' object has no attribute 'name'
[DEBUG ON]
>>>

Not sure what the issue is, but I would like to offer some design advice. If you move the file opening out of the functions and use x["data"]["races"][0]["timeseries"] as the argument, you can pare down all the data retrieval and make it easier to read.