Manage robot factory settings.
When robots come off the factory floor, they have no name.
The first time you boot them up, a random name is generated in the format of two uppercase letters followed by three digits, such as RX837 or BC811.
Every once in a while we need to reset a robot to its factory settings, which means that their name gets wiped. The next time you ask, it will respond with a new random name.
The names must be random: they should not follow a predictable sequence. Random names means a risk of collisions. Your solution must ensure that every existing robot has a unique name.
Sometimes it is necessary to raise an exception. When you do this, you should include a meaningful error message to indicate what the source of the error is. This makes your code more readable and helps significantly with debugging. Not every exercise will require you to raise an exception, but for those that do, the tests will only pass if you include a message.
To raise a message with an exception, just write it as an argument to the exception type. For example, instead of
raise Exception, you should write:
raise Exception("Meaningful message indicating the source of the error")To run the tests, run the appropriate command below (why they are different):
- Python 2.7:
py.test robot_name_test.py - Python 3.4+:
pytest robot_name_test.py
Alternatively, you can tell Python to run the pytest module (allowing the same command to be used regardless of Python version):
python -m pytest robot_name_test.py
-v: enable verbose output-x: stop running tests on first failure--ff: run failures from previous test before running other test cases
For other options, see python -m pytest -h
Note that, when trying to submit an exercise, make sure the solution is in the $EXERCISM_WORKSPACE/python/robot-name directory.
You can find your Exercism workspace by running exercism debug and looking for the line that starts with Workspace.
For more detailed information about running tests, code style and linting, please see Running the Tests.
A debugging session with Paul Blackwell at gSchool. http://gschool.it
It's possible to submit an incomplete solution so you can see how others have completed the exercise.