removing one list element without using its index

[Pedroski55]

Internally, Python lists are integer indexed dynamic arrays. Here is an interesting, if old, question and interesting answers and links on stackoverflow.

There is quite a lot going on behind the scenes when you add or delete elements!

As I understand it, you cannot access the values in a list without using the pointer variables, the index, which tells us where they are in memory and what kind of value is stored there.

So, if my_list.remove(3) seems to get rid of 3 without using its index, that is only superficially so.

I don't know how .remove() works internally, but you can fake it like this:

def remove_it(val, alist):
    for i in range(len(alist)):
        if alist[i] == val:
            alist.pop(i)
            return alist

my_list = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
remove_it(3, my_list)

Output:
[1, 2, 4, 5]

Or like this:

def remove_it(val, alist):
    for i in range(len(alist)):
        if alist[i] == val:
            del alist[i]
            return alist

my_list = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
remove_it(3, my_list)

Output:
[1, 2, 4, 5]