Functions can take two different kinds of arguments. A positional argument is just the object itself. A keyword argument is a name assigned to an object.
Example
>>> print('Hello', 'world!', sep=', ')
Hello, world!
The first two strings 'Hello'
and 'world!'
are positional arguments.
The sep=', '
is a keyword argument.
Note A keyword argument can be passed positionally in some cases.
def sum(a, b=1):
return a + b
sum(1, b=5)
sum(1, 5) # same as above
Sometimes this is forced, in the case of the pow()
function.
The reverse is also true:
>>> def foo(a, b):
... print(a, b)
...
>>> foo(a=1, b=2)
1 2
>>> foo(b=1, a=2)
2 1
More info
- Keyword only arguments
- Positional only arguments
- /tag param-arg
(Parameters vs. Arguments)