passing an argument to avoid a global

[DeaD_EyE]

Something like this?
https://docs.python.org/3/library/operat...itemgetter

from functools import wraps


def int_itemgetter(index_or_key):
    """
    Is similar to operator.itemgetter, but it converts the element to an integer.
    """
    @wraps(int_itemgetter)
    def inner(element):
        return int(element[index_or_key])
    return inner

some_data = [(1,30,3), (4,20,6), (7,10,9)]
get_second = int_itemgetter(1)
print(sorted(some_data, key=get_second))

or written as class

class Itemgetter:
    def __init__(self, index_or_key):
        self._idx = index_or_key

    def __call__(self, element):
        return int(element[self._idx])

some_data = [(-1,30,3), (-4,20,6), (-7,10,9)]
get_first = Itemgetter(0)
print(sorted(some_data, key=get_first))