Write a Python program to find the remainder of dividing two numbers without using the symbol

Now that you’ve gone through the basics of the Python modulo operator, you’ll look at some examples of using it to solve real-world programming problems. At times, it can be hard to determine when to use the modulo operator in your code. The examples below will give you an idea of the many ways it can be used.

In this section, you’ll see how you can use the modulo operator to determine if a number is even or odd. Using the modulo operator with a modulus of 2, you can check any number to see if it’s evenly divisible by 2. If it is evenly divisible, then it’s an even number.

Take a look at is_even() which checks to see if the num parameter is even:

def is_even(num): return num % 2 == 0

Here num % 2 will equal 0 if num is even and 1 if num is odd. Checking against 0 will return a Boolean of True or False based on whether or not num is even.

Checking for odd numbers is quite similar. To check for an odd number, you invert the equality check:

def is_odd(num): return num % 2 != 0

This function will return True if num % 2 does not equal 0, meaning that there’s a remainder proving num is an odd number. Now, you may be wondering if you could use the following function to determine if num is an odd number:

def is_odd(num): return num % 2 == 1

The answer to this question is yes and no. Technically, this function will work with the way Python calculates modulo with integers. That said, you should avoid comparing the result of a modulo operation with 1 as not all modulo operations in Python will return the same remainder.

You can see why in the following examples:

>>>>>> -3 % 2 1 >>> 3 % -2 -1

In the second example, the remainder takes the sign of the negative divisor and returns -1. In this case, the Boolean check 3 % -2 == 1 would return False.

However, if you compare the modulo operation with 0, then it doesn’t matter which operand is negative. The result will always be True when it’s an even number:

>>>>>> -2 % 2 0 >>> 2 % -2 0

If you stick to comparing a Python modulo operation with 0, then you shouldn’t have any problems checking for even and odd numbers or any other multiples of a number in your code.

In the next section, you’ll take a look at how you can use the modulo operator with loops to control the flow of your program.

With the Python modulo operator, you can run code at specific intervals inside a loop. This is done by performing a modulo operation with the current index of the loop and a modulus. The modulus number determines how often the interval-specific code will run in the loop.

Here’s an example:

def split_names_into_rows(name_list, modulus=3): for index, name in enumerate(name_list, start=1): print(f"{name:-^15} ", end="") if index % modulus == 0: print() print()

This code defines split_names_into_rows(), which takes two parameters. name_list is a list of names that should be split into rows. modulus sets a modulus for the operation, effectively determining how many names should be in each row. split_names_into_rows() will loop over name_list and start a new row after it hits the modulus value.

Before breaking down the function in more detail, take a look at it in action:

>>>>>> names = ["Picard", "Riker", "Troi", "Crusher", "Worf", "Data", "La Forge"] >>> split_names_into_rows(names) ----Picard----- -----Riker----- -----Troi------ ----Crusher---- -----Worf------ -----Data------ ---La Forge----

As you can see, the list of names has been split into three rows, with a maximum of three names in each row. modulus defaults to 3, but you can specify any number:

>>>>>> split_names_into_rows(names, modulus=4) ----Picard----- -----Riker----- -----Troi------ ----Crusher---- -----Worf------ -----Data------ ---La Forge---- >>> split_names_into_rows(names, modulus=2) ----Picard----- -----Riker----- -----Troi------ ----Crusher---- -----Worf------ -----Data------ ---La Forge---- >>> split_names_into_rows(names, modulus=1) ----Picard----- -----Riker----- -----Troi------ ----Crusher---- -----Worf------ -----Data------ ---La Forge----

Now that you’ve seen the code in action, you can break down what it’s doing. First, it uses enumerate() to iterate over name_list, assigning the current item in the list to name and a count value to index. You can see that the optional start argument for enumerate() is set to 1. This means that the index count will start at 1 instead of 0:

for index, name in enumerate(name_list, start=1):

Next, inside the loop, the function calls print() to output name to the current row. The end parameter for print() is an empty string ("") so it won’t output a newline at the end of the string. An f-string is passed to print(), which uses the string output formatting syntax that Python provides:

print(f"{name:-^15} ", end="")

Without getting into too much detail, the :-^15 syntax tells print() to do the following:

Output at least 15 characters, even if the string is shorter than 15 characters.
Center align the string.
Fill any space on the right or left of the string with the hyphen character (-).

Now that the name has been printed to the row, take a look at the main part of split_names_into_rows():

if index % modulus == 0: print()

This code takes the current iteration index and, using the modulo operator, compares it with modulus. If the result equals 0, then it can run interval-specific code. In this case, the function calls print() to add a newline, which starts a new row.

The above code is only one example. Using the pattern index % modulus == 0 allows you to run different code at specific intervals in your loops. In the next section, you’ll take this concept a bit further and look at cyclic iteration.

Cyclic iteration describes a type of iteration that will reset once it gets to a certain point. Generally, this type of iteration is used to restrict the index of the iteration to a certain range.

You can use the modulo operator to create cyclic iteration. Take a look at an example using the turtle library to draw a shape:

import turtle import random def draw_with_cyclic_iteration(): colors = ["green", "cyan", "orange", "purple", "red", "yellow", "white"] turtle.bgcolor("gray8") # Hex: #333333 turtle.pendown() turtle.pencolor(random.choice(colors)) # First color is random i = 0 # Initial index while True: i = (i + 1) % 6 # Update the index turtle.pensize(i) # Set pensize to i turtle.forward(225) turtle.right(170) # Pick a random color if i == 0: turtle.pencolor(random.choice(colors))

The above code uses an infinite loop to draw a repeating star shape. After every six iterations, it changes the color of the pen. The pen size increases with each iteration until i is reset back to 0. If you run the code, then you should get something similar to this:

The important parts of this code are highlighted below:

import turtle import random def draw_with_cyclic_iteration(): colors = ["green", "cyan", "orange", "purple", "red", "yellow", "white"] turtle.bgcolor("gray8") # Hex: #333333 turtle.pendown() turtle.pencolor(random.choice(colors)) i = 0 # Initial index while True: i = (i + 1) % 6 # Update the index turtle.pensize(i) # Set pensize to i turtle.forward(225) turtle.right(170) # Pick a random color if i == 0: turtle.pencolor(random.choice(colors))

Each time through the loop, i is updated based on the results of (i + 1) % 6. This new i value is used to increase the .pensize with each iteration. Once i reaches 5, (i + 1) % 6 will equal 0, and i will reset back to 0.

You can see the steps of the iteration below for more clarification:

i = 0 : (0 + 1) % 6 = 1 i = 1 : (1 + 1) % 6 = 2 i = 2 : (2 + 1) % 6 = 3 i = 3 : (3 + 1) % 6 = 4 i = 4 : (4 + 1) % 6 = 5 i = 5 : (5 + 1) % 6 = 0 # Reset

When i is reset back to 0, the .pencolor changes to a new random color as seen below:

if i == 0: turtle.pencolor(random.choice(colors))

The code in this section uses 6 as the modulus, but you could set it to any number to adjust how many times the loop will iterate before resetting the value i.

In this section, you’ll look at how you can use the modulo operator to convert units. The following examples take smaller units and convert them into larger units without using decimals. The modulo operator is used to determine any remainder that may exist when the smaller unit isn’t evenly divisible by the larger unit.

In this first example, you’ll convert inches into feet. The modulo operator is used to get the remaining inches that don’t evenly divide into feet. The floor division operator (//) is used to get the total feet rounded down:

def convert_inches_to_feet(total_inches): inches = total_inches % 12 feet = total_inches // 12 print(f"{total_inches} inches = {feet} feet and {inches} inches")

Here’s an example of the function in use:

>>>>>> convert_inches_to_feet(450) 450 inches = 37 feet and 6 inches

As you can see from the output, 450 % 12 returns 6, which is the remaining inches that weren’t evenly divided into feet. The result of 450 // 12 is 37, which is the total number of feet by which the inches were evenly divided.

You can take this a bit further in this next example. convert_minutes_to_days() takes an integer, total_mins, representing a number of minutes and outputs the period of time in days, hours, and minutes:

def convert_minutes_to_days(total_mins): days = total_mins // 1440 extra_minutes = total_mins % 1440 hours = extra_minutes // 60 minutes = extra_minutes % 60 print(f"{total_mins} = {days} days, {hours} hours, and {minutes} minutes")

Breaking this down, you can see that the function does the following:

Determines the total number of evenly divisible days with total_mins // 1440, where 1440 is the number of minutes in a day
Calculates any extra_minutes left over with total_mins % 1440
Uses the extra_minutes to get the evenly divisible hours and any extra minutes

You can see how it works below:

>>>>>> convert_minutes_to_days(1503) 1503 = 1 days, 1 hours, and 3 minutes >>> convert_minutes_to_days(3456) 3456 = 2 days, 9 hours, and 36 minutes >>> convert_minutes_to_days(35000) 35000 = 24 days, 7 hours, and 20 minutes

While the above examples only deal with converting inches to feet and minutes to days, you could use any type of units with the modulo operator to convert a smaller unit into a larger unit.

Note: Both of the above examples could be modified to use divmod() to make the code more succinct. If you remember, divmod() returns a tuple containing the results of floor division and modulo using the supplied parameters.

Below, the floor division and modulo operators have been replaced with divmod():

def convert_inches_to_feet_updated(total_inches): feet, inches = divmod(total_inches, 12) print(f"{total_inches} inches = {feet} feet and {inches} inches")

As you can see, divmod(total_inches, 12) returns a tuple, which is unpacked into feet and inches.

If you try this updated function, then you’ll receive the same results as before:

>>>>>> convert_inches_to_feet(450) 450 inches = 37 feet and 6 inches >>> convert_inches_to_feet_updated(450) 450 inches = 37 feet and 6 inches

You receive the same outcome, but now the code is more concise. You could update convert_minutes_to_days() as well:

def convert_minutes_to_days_updated(total_mins): days, extra_minutes = divmod(total_mins, 1440) hours, minutes = divmod(extra_minutes, 60) print(f"{total_mins} = {days} days, {hours} hours, and {minutes} minutes")

Using divmod(), the function is easier to read than the previous version and returns the same result:

>>>>>> convert_minutes_to_days(1503) 1503 = 1 days, 1 hours, and 3 minutes >>> convert_minutes_to_days_updated(1503) 1503 = 1 days, 1 hours, and 3 minutes

Using divmod() isn’t necessary for all situations, but it makes sense here as the unit conversion calculations use both floor division and modulo.

Now that you’ve seen how to use the modulo operator to convert units, in the next section you’ll look at how you can use the modulo operator to check for prime numbers.

In this next example, you’ll take a look at how you can use the Python modulo operator to check whether a number is a prime number. A prime number is any number that contains only two factors, 1 and itself. Some examples of prime numbers are 2, 3, 5, 7, 23, 29, 59, 83, and 97.

The code below is an implementation for determining the primality of a number using the modulo operator:

def check_prime_number(num): if num < 2: print(f"{num} must be greater than or equal to 2 to be prime.") return factors = [(1, num)] i = 2 while i * i <= num: if num % i == 0: factors.append((i, num//i)) i += 1 if len(factors) > 1: print(f"{num} is not prime. It has the following factors: {factors}") else: print(f"{num} is a prime number")

This code defines check_prime_number(), which takes the parameter num and checks to see if it’s a prime number. If it is, then a message is displayed stating that num is a prime number. If it’s not a prime number, then a message is displayed with all the factors of the number.

Note: The above code isn’t the most efficient way to check for prime numbers. If you’re interested in digging deeper, then check out the Sieve of Eratosthenes and Sieve of Atkin for examples of more performant algorithms for finding prime numbers.

Before you look more closely at the function, here are the results using some different numbers:

>>>>>> check_prime_number(44) 44 is not prime. It has the following factors: [(1, 44), (2, 22), (4, 11)] >>> check_prime_number(53) 53 is a prime number >>> check_prime_number(115) 115 is not prime. It has the following factors: [(1, 115), (5, 23)] >>> check_prime_number(997) 997 is a prime number

Digging into the code, you can see it starts by checking if num is less than 2. Prime numbers can only be greater than or equal to 2. If num is less than 2, then the function doesn’t need to continue. It will print() a message and return:

if num < 2: print(f"{num} must be greater than or equal to 2 to be prime.") return

If num is greater than 2, then the function checks if num is a prime number. To check this, the function iterates over all the numbers between 2 and the square root of num to see if any divide evenly into num. If one of the numbers divides evenly, then a factor has been found, and num can’t be a prime number.

Here’s the main part of the function:

factors = [(1, num)] i = 2 while i * i <= num: if num % i == 0: factors.append((i, num//i)) i += 1

There’s a lot to unpack here, so let’s take it step by step.

First, a factors list is created with the initial factors, (1, num). This list will be used to store any other factors that are found:

Next, starting with 2, the code increments i until it reaches the square root of num. At each iteration, it compares num with i to see if it’s evenly divisible. The code only needs to check up to and including the square root of num because it wouldn’t contain any factors above this:

i = 2 while i * i <= num: if num % i == 0: factors.append((i, num//i)) i += 1

Instead of trying to determine the square root of num, the function uses a while loop to see if i * i <= num. As long as i * i <= num, the loop hasn’t reached the square root of num.

Inside the while loop, the modulo operator checks if num is evenly divisible by i:

factors = [(1, num)] i = 2 # Start the initial index at 2 while i * i <= num: if num % i == 0: factors.append((i, num//i)) i += 1

If num is evenly divisible by i, then i is a factor of num, and a tuple of the factors is added to the factors list.

Once the while loop is complete, the code checks to see if any additional factors were found:

if len(factors) > 1: print(f"{num} is not prime. It has the following factors: {factors}") else: print(f"{num} is a prime number")

If more than one tuple exists in the factors list, then num can’t be a prime number. For nonprime numbers, the factors are printed out. For prime numbers, the function prints a message stating that num is a prime number.

The Python modulo operator can be used to create ciphers. A cipher is a type of algorithm for performing encryption and decryption on an input, usually text. In this section, you’ll look at two ciphers, the Caesar cipher and the Vigenère cipher.

The first cipher that you’ll look at is the Caesar cipher, named after Julius Caesar, who used it to secretly communicate messages. It’s a substitution cipher that uses letter substitution to encrypt a string of text.

The Caesar cipher works by taking a letter to be encrypted and shifting it a certain number of positions to the left or right in the alphabet. Whichever letter is in that position is used as the encrypted character. This same shift value is applied to all characters in the string.

For example, if the shift were 5, then A would shift up five letters to become F, B would become G, and so on. Below you can see the encryption process for the text REALPYTHON with a shift of 5:

The resulting cipher is WJFQUDYMTS.

Decrypting the cipher is done by reversing the shift. Both the encryption and decryption processes can be described with the following expressions, where char_index is the index of the character in the alphabet:

encrypted_char_index = (char_index + shift) % 26 decrypted_char_index = (char_index - shift) % 26

This cipher uses the modulo operator to make sure that, when shifting a letter, the index will wrap around if the end of the alphabet is reached. Now that you know how this cipher works, take a look at an implementation:

import string def caesar_cipher(text, shift, decrypt=False): if not text.isascii() or not text.isalpha(): raise ValueError("Text must be ASCII and contain no numbers.") lowercase = string.ascii_lowercase uppercase = string.ascii_uppercase result = "" if decrypt: shift = shift * -1 for char in text: if char.islower(): index = lowercase.index(char) result += lowercase[(index + shift) % 26] else: index = uppercase.index(char) result += uppercase[(index + shift) % 26] return result

This code defines a function called caesar_cipher(), which has two required parameters and one optional parameter:

text is the text to be encrypted or decrypted.
shift is the number of positions to shift each letter.
decrypt is a Boolean to set if text should be decrypted.

decrypt is included so that a single function can be used to handle both encryption and decryption. This implementation can handle only alphabetic characters, so the function first checks that text is an alphabetic character in the ASCII encoding:

def caesar_cipher(text, shift, decrypt=False): if not text.isascii() or not text.isalpha(): raise ValueError("Text must be ASCII and contain no numbers.")

The function then defines three variables to store the lowercase ASCII characters, the uppercase ASCII characters, and the results of the encryption or decryption:

lowercase = string.ascii_lowercase # "abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz" uppercase = string.ascii_uppercase # "ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ" result = ""

Next, if the function is being used to decrypt text, then it multiplies shift by -1 to make it shift backward:

if decrypt: shift = shift * -1

Finally, caesar_cipher() loops over the individual characters in text and performs the following actions for each char:

Check if char is lowercase or uppercase.
Get the index of the char in either the lowercase or uppercase ASCII lists.
Add a shift to this index to determine the index of the cipher character to use.
Use % 26 to make sure the shift will wrap back to the start of the alphabet.
Append the cipher character to the result string.

After the loop finishes iterating over the text value, the result is returned:

for char in text: if char.islower(): index = lowercase.index(char) result += lowercase[(index + shift) % 26] else: index = uppercase.index(char) result += uppercase[(index + shift) % 26] return result

Here’s the full code again:

Now run the code in the Python REPL using the text meetMeAtOurHideOutAtTwo with a shift of 10:

>>>>>> caesar_cipher("meetMeAtOurHideOutAtTwo", 10) woodWoKdYebRsnoYedKdDgy

The encrypted result is woodWoKdYebRsnoYedKdDgy. Using this encrypted text, you can run the decryption to get the original text:

>>>>>> caesar_cipher("woodWoKdYebRsnoYedKdDgy", 10, decrypt=True) meetMeAtOurHideOutAtTwo

The Caesar cipher is fun to play around with for an introduction to cryptography. While the Caesar cipher is rarely used on its own, it’s the basis for more complex substitution ciphers. In the next section, you’ll look at one of the Caesar cipher’s descendants, the Vigenère cipher.

The Vigenère cipher is a polyalphabetic substitution cipher. To perform its encryption, it employs a different Caesar cipher for each letter of the input text. The Vigenère cipher uses a keyword to determine which Caesar cipher should be used to find the cipher letter.

You can see an example of the encryption process in the following image. In this example, the input text REALPYTHON is encrypted using the keyword MODULO:

For each letter of the input text, REALPYTHON, a letter from the keyword MODULO is used to determine which Caesar cipher column should be selected. If the keyword is shorter than the input text, as is the case with MODULO, then the letters of the keyword are repeated until all letters of the input text have been encrypted.

Below is an implementation of the Vigenère cipher. As you’ll see, the modulo operator is used twice in the function:

import string def vigenere_cipher(text, key, decrypt=False): if not text.isascii() or not text.isalpha() or not text.isupper(): raise ValueError("Text must be uppercase ASCII without numbers.") uppercase = string.ascii_uppercase # "ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ" results = "" for i, char in enumerate(text): current_key = key[i % len(key)] char_index = uppercase.index(char) key_index = uppercase.index(current_key) if decrypt: index = char_index - key_index + 26 else: index = char_index + key_index results += uppercase[index % 26] return results

You may have noticed that the signature for vigenere_cipher() is quite similar to caesar_cipher() from the previous section:

def vigenere_cipher(text, key, decrypt=False): if not text.isascii() or not text.isalpha() or not text.isupper(): raise ValueError("Text must be uppercase ASCII without numbers.") uppercase = string.ascii_uppercase results = ""

The main difference is that, instead of a shift parameter, vigenere_cipher() takes a key parameter, which is the keyword to be used during encryption and decryption. Another difference is the addition of text.isupper(). Based on this implementation, vigenere_cipher() can only accept input text that is all uppercase.

Like caesar_cipher(), vigenere_cipher() iterates over each letter of the input text to encrypt or decrypt it:

for i, char in enumerate(text): current_key = key[i % len(key)]

In the above code, you can see the function’s first use of the modulo operator:

current_key = key[i % len(key)]

Here, the current_key value is determined based on an index returned from i % len(key). This index is used to select a letter from the key string, such as M from MODULO.

The modulo operator allows you to use any length keyword regardless of the length of the text to be encrypted. Once the index i, the index of the character currently being encrypted, equals the length of the keyword, it will start over from the beginning of the keyword.

For each letter of the input text, several steps determine how to encrypt or decrypt it:

Determine the char_index based on the index of char inside uppercase.
Determine the key_index based on the index of current_key inside uppercase.
Use char_index and key_index to get the index for the encrypted or decrypted character.

Take a look at these steps in the code below:

char_index = uppercase.index(char) key_index = uppercase.index(current_key) if decrypt: index = char_index - key_index + 26 else: index = char_index + key_index

You can see that the indices for decryption and encryption are calculated differently. That’s why decrypt is used in this function. This way, you can use the function for both encryption and decryption.

After the index is determined, you find the function’s second use of the modulo operator:

results += uppercase[index % 26]

index % 26 ensures that the index of the character doesn’t exceed 25, thus making sure it stays inside the alphabet. With this index, the encrypted or decrypted character is selected from uppercase and appended to results.

Here’s the full code the Vigenère cipher again:

Now go ahead and run it in the Python REPL:

>>>>>> vigenere_cipher(text="REALPYTHON", key="MODULO") DSDFAMFVRH >>> encrypted = vigenere_cipher(text="REALPYTHON", key="MODULO") >>> print(encrypted) DSDFAMFVRH >>> vigenere_cipher(encrypted, "MODULO", decrypt=True) REALPYTHON