Permutations CodeWars problem solved!

Question

i have solved a question in codewars:

https://www.codewars.com/kata/5254ca2719453dcc0b00027d/python , here's my solution is it unefficient to use itertools because people are blaming that is cheating using libraries should i try to solve it on other ways and is it this bad way to implement the question this is my first time to solve kata 4kuy a months ago it wasn't possible today is my first one to be solved because of difficulty of the questions.Can you tell me is using libraries considered as a cheating because a lot of people say that is and as a begginer programmer i don't know if i am begginer i am one year into this should i try to focus more on not using libraries?

Thank you.

import itertools
def permutations(s):
      result = itertools.permutations(s,len(s))
      new_list = []
      for item in result:
            new_list.append("".join(item))
      return sorted(set(new_list))

Answer 1

As to whether or not you should use libraries - depends entirely on what you want to achieve. Perhaps briefly put, if you enjoy the algorithmic challenge of essentially building the algorithm behind itertools.permutations, then do it. If you want to build efficient software and reuse good work other people have already done, do use libraries. Libraries exist because well-crafted and well-tested solutions for general problems are obviously very useful.

As for your solution, it's usually a good idea to use list (or set) comprehension and to avoid explicit for loops. This is usually considered more Pythonic, and can often be more efficient. So we could just do:

import itertools

def permutations(s: str) -> list:
    return list({''.join(p) for p in itertools.permutations(s)})