Understanding the Unpacking Operators (* and **) in Python 3.x

> args = [3, 6]
> list(range(*args))
[3, 4, 5]

As an example, when we have a list of three arguments, we can use the * operator inside a function call to unpack it into the three arguments:

def f(a,b,c):
    print('a={},b={},c={}'.format(a,b,c))

> z = ['I','like','Python']
> f(*z)
a=I,b=like,c=Python

> z = [['I','really'],'like','Python']
> f(*z)
a=['I', 'really'],b=like,c=Python

In Python 3 it is possible to use the operator * on the left side of an assignment, allowing to specify a “catch-all” name which will be assigned a list of all items not assigned to a “regular” name:

> a, *b, c = range(5)
> a
0
> c
4
> b
[1, 2, 3]

The ** operator can be used to unpack a dictionary of arguments as a collection of keyword arguments. Calling the same function f that we defined above:

 

> d = {'c':'Python','b':'like', 'a':'I'}
> f(**d)
a=I,b=like,c=Python

and when there is a missing argument in the dictionary (‘a’ in this example),  the following error message will be printed:

> d2 = {'c':'Python','b':'like'}
> f(**d2)
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>
TypeError: f() missing 1 required positional argument: 'a'

 
Tried with: Python 3.6.5