ArcGIS and Python

Question

I'm trying to get my head around python integration in ARC. But we don't learn it till next semester, however I see it fit to fulfill my need for my project. (Took second semester project in first)

I'm attempting to take multiple conditions (low, medium, high) and assign a value. 5 = no results, 4 = low, and so on till 0 = not present.

I understand this is using a while loop?

IE 
def Condition (field_16,field_8):
     While field_8 == "choice0":    
          if value(or is this field_16) == "choice0"  
               return "5"

Etc, can anyone give me a tip or shell?

And then the condition = Condition (!field_16!)

Little stuck with python in arc.

Thanks!

Answer 1

Update Cursors are often used instead of the field calculator in ArcGIS to update row values. The cursor syntax is usually more intuitive than the field calculator interface. For example:

import arcpy

fc = r'C:\path\to\your.gdb\feature_class'

with arcpy.da.UpdateCursor(fc, ["some_value_field", "some_field_to_write_values"]) as cursor:
    for row in cursor:
        """
        note that row[0] refers to "some_value_field"
        and row[1] refers to "some_field_to_write_values"
        """
        if row[0] == "low":
            row[1] = 4
        elif row[0] == "no":
            row[1] = 5
        elif row[0] == "not present":
            row[1] = 0
        cursor.updateRow(row)