Dictionaries containing list that contain dictionaries

Please bear with me if I am not able to explain this clearly. I'm new to python programming although I've done some programming in perl previously. I'm kind of stuck trying to figure out how to extract some data from the following structure.


abc = {
7777 : [ {"name":"ark"}, { "city":"palo alto"},{ "tel":"123456789"} ],
8888 : [ {"name": "pinky"}, {"city":"palo alto"}, {"tel" : "987654321"} ],
9999 : [ {"name": "joey"}, {"city":"los altos"}, {"tel" : "234543213"} ],
...
}


How can I pull the value for the "tel" key inside the lists above where the "city" matches "palo alto"? I can print the lists and even indices of the lists using some for loops but I'm having a difficult time figuring out how to extract or match the 'city' in an if statement.

Thanks!

Do you have some control over the structure? Your problem would be much easier to solve if you had a dictionary of dictionaries, rather than a dictionary of lists of dictionaries, and there doesn't really seem to be any reason why you'd need a list of single-entry dictionaries rather than a dictionary with multiple entries.

Thanks for the quick reply!

I do have control over how the structure is built and can change it although I may need some advice for that.
The above example I provided in the OP was contrived from my actual data to make the question a bit more clear. But here is actually what I am doing. I'm actually pulling the data from a web service call using suds. The call returns the following structure which I cannot alter.

[(mergedDefectDataObj){
checkerName = "NULL_RETURNS"
checkerSubcategory = "unimpl"
cid = 49473
componentName = "Default.Other"
defectStateAttributeValues[] =
(defectStateAttributeValueDataObj){
attributeDefinitionId =
(attributeDefinitionIdDataObj){
name = "Provenance"
}
attributeValueId =
(attributeValueIdDataObj){
name = "Parent - Baseline"
}
},
(defectStateAttributeValueDataObj){
attributeDefinitionId =
(attributeDefinitionIdDataObj){
name = "DefectStatus"
}
attributeValueId =
(attributeValueIdDataObj){
name = "New"
}
},
(defectStateAttributeValueDataObj){
attributeDefinitionId =
(attributeDefinitionIdDataObj){
name = "Classification"
}
attributeValueId =
(attributeValueIdDataObj){
name = "Unclassified"
}
},

domain = "STATIC_C"
filePathname = "/media/3TB/arkster/work/install/Build/gtk_Val/gtk+-2.14.2/gtk/gtkfilechooserbutton.c"

},

(mergedDefectDataObj){
checkerName = "NULL_RETURNS"
checkerSubcategory = "unimpl"
cid = 38796
componentName = "Default.Other"
defectStateAttributeValues[] =
(defectStateAttributeValueDataObj){
attributeDefinitionId =
(attributeDefinitionIdDataObj){
name = "Provenance"
}
attributeValueId =
(attributeValueIdDataObj){
name = "Parent - Baseline"
}
},
(defectStateAttributeValueDataObj){
attributeDefinitionId =
(attributeDefinitionIdDataObj){
name = "DefectStatus"
}
attributeValueId =
(attributeValueIdDataObj){
name = "New"
}
},
(defectStateAttributeValueDataObj){
attributeDefinitionId =
(attributeDefinitionIdDataObj){
name = "Classification"
}
attributeValueId =
(attributeValueIdDataObj){
name = "Unclassified"
}
},

domain = "STATIC_C"
filePathname = "/media/3TB/arkster/work/install/Build/gtk_Val/gtk+-2.14.2/modules/printbackends/lpr/gtkprintbackendlpr.c"

},
...
]

The above is the output for self.getMergedDefectsForStreamsResponse.mergedDefects which I then process into individual dictionaries that are appended into a list using setdefault with the 'cid' being the main dictionary key. Here is the code that does that.

for mergedDefect in self.getMergedDefectsForStreamsResponse.mergedDefects:

for i in mergedDefect.defectStateAttributeValues:
if i.attributeValueId == '':
continue
self.mergedDefectDict.setdefault(mergedDefect.cid, []).append({i.attributeDefinitionId['name']:i.attributeValueId['name']})

self.mergedDefectDict.setdefault(mergedDefect.cid, []).append({ "componentName" : mergedDefect.componentName})
self.mergedDefectDict.setdefault(mergedDefect.cid, []).append({ 'checkerName' :mergedDefect.checkerName})
self.mergedDefectDict.setdefault(mergedDefect.cid, []).append({ 'domain' : mergedDefect.domain})
self.mergedDefectDict.setdefault(mergedDefect.cid, []).append({ 'filePathName' : mergedDefect.filePathname})


The above then creates the structure that I end up with.

Dict = {
49473L: [
{Provenance: Parent - Baseline},
{DefectStatus: New},
{Classification: Unclassified},
{Comment: "Please Fix." },
{'componentName': Default.Other},
{'checkerName': NULL_RETURNS},
{'domain': STATIC_C},
{'filePathName': /media/3TB/arkster/work/install/Build/gtk_Val/gtk+-2.14.2/gtk/gtkfilechooserbutton.c}
],


38796L: [
{Provenance: Parent - Baseline},
{DefectStatus: New},
{Classification: Unclassified},
{Comment: "False Positive. Please ignore"},
{'componentName': Default.Other},
{'checkerName': NULL_RETURNS},
{'domain': STATIC_C},
{'filePathName': /media/3TB/arkster/work/install/Build/gtk_Val/gtk+-2.14.2/modules/printbackends/lpr/gtkprintbackendlpr.c}
],
...
}


Is there a way that I can manage the above using a dictionary of dictionaries instead of using setdefault to pile stuff into a list?
I can provide more context if needed. Thanks much for the help!

Without knowing what these methods do, I'll guess the following might give a dictionary of dictionaries.

might give a dictionary with access

Thank you! This is just what I needed.