write() takes 2 positional arguments but 3 were given

Question

My program produces the desired results correctly as I print them on the screen using the print() function:

for k in main_dic.keys():
    s = 0
    print ('stem:', k)
    print ('word forms and frequencies:')
    for w in main_dic[k]:
        print ('%-10s ==> %10d' % (w,word_forms[w]))
        s += word_forms[w]
    print ('stem total frequency:', s)

    print ('------------------------------')

I want to write the results with the exact format to a text file though. I tried with this:

file = codecs.open('result.txt','a','utf-8')
for k in main_dic.keys():
    file.write('stem:', k)
    file.write('\n')
    file.write('word forms and frequencies:\n')
    for w in main_dic[k]:
        file.write('%-10s ==> %10d' % (w,word_forms[w]))
        file.write('\n')
        s += word_forms[w]
    file.write('stem total frequency:', s)
    file.write('\n')
    file.write('------------------------------\n')
file.close()

but I get the error:

TypeError: write() takes 2 positional arguments but 3 were given

score 3 · Accepted Answer · answered Jul 16 '14 at 17:05

print() takes separate arguments, file.write() does not. You can reuse print() to write to your file instead:

with open('result.txt', 'a', encoding='utf-8') as outf:
    for k in main_dic:
        s = 0
        print('stem:', k, file=outf)
        print('word forms and frequencies:', file=outf)
        for w in main_dic[k]:
            print('%-10s ==> %10d' % (w,word_forms[w]), file=outf)
            s += word_forms[w]
        print ('stem total frequency:', s, file=outf)
        print ('------------------------------')

I also used the built-in open(), there is no need to use the older and far less versatile codecs.open() in Python 3. You don't need to call .keys() either, looping over the dictionary directly also works.

Ashoka Lella · Answer 2 · 2014-07-16T17:10:40.247

2

file.write is given multiple arguments when its expecting only one string argument

file.write('stem total frequency:', s)
                                  ^

The error gets raised as 'stem total frequency:', s are treated as two different arguments. This can be fixed by concatenation

file.write('stem total frequency: '+str(s))
                                  ^

edited Jul 16 '14 at 17:10

answered Jul 16 '14 at 17:05

Ashoka Lella

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score 1 · Answer 3 · answered Jul 16 '14 at 17:05

1

file.write('stem:', k)

You're supplying two arguments to write on this line, when it only wants one. In contrast, print is happy to take as many arguments as you care to give it. Try:

file.write('stem: ' + str(k))

answered Jul 16 '14 at 17:05

Kevin

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write() takes 2 positional arguments but 3 were given

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