How to create a multiple choice question program with an external text file?

Question

I am trying to create a multiple choice question program that will read a text file, pose 5 of the questions in a random order, receive the answer, and then display the answer if it's false. Here's what I've managed to write:

First an example of the file containing the questions:

mcq.txt:

Which of these countries is an island ? A-France B-Lithuania C-Australia D-Korea;;C
One byte is A-1bit B-4 bits C-8 bits D-32 bits;;C
What event of 1934 contributed to the creation of the Popular Front? A-The congress of Tours B-The riots of the leagues C-The Crash of Wall-Street;;B
What event is at the origin of the crisis of the Thirties? A-The Russian Revolution B-The rise of fascism C-The First World War D-The Wall Street Crash;;D
What is the color of Adam's white horse A-Green B-Red C-Grey D-White;;D
With 1 byte you can encode A-255 characters ​​B-8 characters ​​C-16 characters ​​D-256 characters;;D
What is Microsoft Windows? A-A type of computer B-An operating system C-A database management system;;B
The binary system uses the base A-2 B-10 C-8 D-16 E-None of these answers are true.;;A
In Greco-Roman mythology, the gods met on A-Mount Sinai B-Vesuvius C-Mount Olympus;;C
In Greek mythology, Pegasus is A-A winged horse B-A man with an eagle's head C-A giant;;A
When was the World War II armistice signed A-May 8, 1945 B-July 14, 1940 C-November 11, 1945 D-June 18, 1940;;A
Before 2003, the countries of Bosnia, Croatia, Slovenia, Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia formed A-Bulgaria B-Czechoslovakia C-Kosovo D-Yugoslavia;;D
What is this infectious disease caused by Koch's bacillus called? A-Plague B-Tuberculosis C-Poliomyelitis D-Scabies;;B

the program:

import random
def mcq():
    with open("mcq.txt", "r") as f:
        i=0
        while i<5:
            line=f.readline()
            a=line.split(";;")
            print(a[0])
            answer=input("your answer?")
            if answer.upper()==a[1]:
                print("correct")
            else:
                print("false, the anwer was", a[1])
            i=i+1
mcq()

The program seems to be working but asks the questions in order, which is normal because we didn't use a random module, but when we put random.shuffle(line) we encounter the error "'str' object does not support item assignment".

To solve this I tried writing this program which is supposed to assign numbers to each line in a roundabout way and ask the questions in a random order, but it just gives numbers and is pretty much useless:

import random
with open("qcm.txt", "r") as f:
    ligne=f.read().splitlines()
    i=range(0,30)
    x=zip(ligne,i)
    for i in range(10):
        x=random.randint(0, 30)
        print(x)

The other problem with the main program is that the answer is always false. Even though I put upper() it doesn't seem to change anything.

I also thought about using dictionaries and assigning the question to the key and the answer to the value, but I don't know how to randomise it and if it's a good idea.

I would be grateful if you could help me.

Answer 1

just create a dictionary with this splitted values Question is the key and answer will contain a list of dictionaries

{"question":[{"a":"","b":"","c":"","d":"","ans":"a"}]}

Answer 2

I would suggest a .json file instead, containing this:

{
    "question1": ["a", "b", "c", "d", {"correct answer": "c"}],
    "question2": ["a", "b", "c", "d", {"correct answer": "d"}]
}

Or even better:

{
    "question1": ["a", "b", "c", "d", "c"],
    "question2": ["a", "b", "c", "d", "d"] # The correct answer is the last letter in the list
}

Or, if you want the options to be displayed too:

{
    "question1": {"a": "Macedonia", "b": "Kosovo", "c": "Australia", "d": "Austria", "correct": "c"}
}

---

To do this you need the built-in module called json to be imported.

You can access this this way:

with open(r"file.json", 'r') as file:
    questions = json.load(file)
for question in questions.keys():
    answer = input(question)
    if (answer.lower() == questions[question][-1]):
        # The answer is correct

Or, if you choose the last option I suggested above for the .json file:

for question in questions.keys():
    answer = input(question)
    if (answer.lower() == questions[question]["correct"]):
        # The answer is correct

---

Since random module provides the random.choice function, you should better use it on the iterable returned by questions.keys():

import random
while True:
    question = random.choice(questions)
    # all the other stuff...