Minor Performance Hits Elimination

[v1k1nghawk]

Type of Change

feature + code quality improvements
API changed or not: no

Description

Reduce the performance impact of dictionaries creation and lists building (plus remove import duplication and improve formatting).

How has this PR been tested?

list comprehension vs list():

python3 -m timeit --number=10000000 "
[l for l in 'data']
"

10000000 loops, best of 5: 401 nsec per loop

python3 -m timeit --number=10000000 "
list('data')
"

10000000 loops, best of 5: 326 nsec per loop

dict() vs {}:

python3 -m timeit --number=10000000 "
dict()
"

10000000 loops, best of 5: 139 nsec per loop

python3 -m timeit --number=10000000 "
{}
"

10000000 loops, best of 5: 65.4 nsec per loop

Setup:

• Python 3.12.3
• Linux 6.8.9-300.fc40.x86_64

Dependency Change?

any library dependency introduced or removed: no

[justinchuby]

All of these changes can be auto-fixed by ruff. I suggest we wait and use the tool to fix everything, once the CI pipeline is set up.