Printing a staircase of text

Question

So basically, a user is prompted to input a number of stairs and a staircase when a guy on it is generated. I know this is sloppy and my variable names are rough, I'm actively working to change them now. I thought I would go ahead and post the working code though.

How can I improve on this? What can I do better to do more with less?

Note: I'm very new to Python and general programming.

def render(num, num3):
    num2 = num - 1
    white_space7 = ""

    white_space = ""
    for x in range(num):
        white_space = white_space + "       "
    c = num
    white_space5 = makeSpace(Num - num2)
    if num3 != 0:
        white_space7 = makeFloor(num3)
        print(white_space + "      *" + white_space5 + "*")
        print(white_space + "   o  *" + white_space5 + "*")
        print(white_space + "  /|\ *" + white_space5 + "*")
        print(white_space + "  / \ *" + white_space5 + "*")
        print(white_space + "*******" + white_space7 + "*")
    else:
        print(white_space + "      *" + white_space5 + "*")
        print(white_space + "   o  *" + white_space5 + "*")
        print(white_space + "  /|\ *" + white_space5 + "*")
        print(white_space + "  / \ *" + white_space5 + "*")
        print(white_space + "*******" + white_space7 + white_space5 + "*")

def makeSpace(num):
    white_space4 = ""
    for x in range(num):
        white_space4 = white_space4 + "       "
    return white_space4

def makeFloor(num):
    white_space6 = ""
    num4 = num + 1
    for x in range(num4):
        white_space6 = white_space6 + "*******"
    return white_space6



Num = raw_input("Number of Stairs:" )
Num = int(Num)

white_space2 = ""
for x in range(Num + 1):
    white_space2 = white_space2 + "       "
print(white_space2 + "*******")
y = Num

white_space2 = ""


for x in range(Num):
    if (x < Num - 1):
        render(y,0)
        y -= 1
    else:
        render(y,Num - 1)
        y -= 1

Answer 1

Conciseness

Python overloads operators, that is * works differently for numbers or numbers and strings. You can use it to shorten some functions of yours:

def makeSpace(num):
    return " " * 7 * num

def makeFloor(num):
    return "*" * 7 * (num + 1)

Global typo

white_space5 = makeSpace(Num - num2)
                         ^

That n should be lowercase as uppercase it refers to a global and referring to a global variable from a function is very bad.

Use your functions

You can use makeSpace once more in render:

def render(num, num3):
    num2 = num - 1
    white_space7 = ""

    white_space = makeSpace(num)
    white_space5 = makeSpace(num - num2)
    # ...

The same goes for the top level code (that should be put in a main function for modularity)

def main():

    Num = raw_input("Number of Stairs:" )
    Num = int(Num)

    white_space2 = makeSpace(Num + 1)
    print(white_space2 + "*******")
    # ...

Variable names

Naming the variables and arguments num or num3 or Num is a very bad idea as it does not tell me about the meaning of what is contained inside. I suggest, Num -> staircase_height as an example but all the names can and should be improved.

Avoid reassigning the same variable

You re-assign white_space7 and that gave me headaches when refactoring, reassigning is generally avoided in Python.

Simplify branching

The printing part in render:

print(white_space + "      *" + white_space5 + "*")
print(white_space + "   o  *" + white_space5 + "*")
print(white_space + "  /|\ *" + white_space5 + "*")
print(white_space + "  / \ *" + white_space5 + "*")
if num3 != 0:
    print(white_space + "*******" + white_space7 + "*")
else:
    print(white_space + "*******" + white_space5 + "*")

Extract common code out of branches.

and

for x in range(staircase_height - 1):
    render(staircase_height - x, 0)
render(staircase_height - (x + 1), staircase_height - 1)

Use less variables

You can use a simple subtraction in the loop to easily avoid the y variable:

for x in range(staircase_height):
    if (x < staircase_height - 1):
        render(staircase_height - x,0)
    else:
        render(staircase_height - x,staircase_height - 1)

and:

print(makeSpace(staircase_height + 1) + ("*" * 7))

Further simplify render

Simply right_pad = makeSpace(1), not the long winded expression that always evaluated to one.