Hey "lanceculnane". :-)
And now you changed it back to "Something"? Why?

I think the error message is really full correct. The value should be equal to -1. Your value is 1. So it is wrong. In the description it is said, that -1 is expectet in the cases of empty and null. So where is the problem?

You have had fun and a good challenge with this kata. So give a "very".
If you think, it was a bad and stupid kata, then give a "stupid" or "bad". But be honest and fair and do not a revenge voting, because your thoughts about the error message are not like mine and like the others.

Have fun at codewars. Learn. And become a wortful member of the great codewars community! :-)

I laughed way too hard at this :D.

@lanceculnane,

I did the Python translation for this kata and would try to help explain/fix any problem but your issue description is so vague that I don't know what you mean. The katas description clearly states:

If the string is null or empty, you should exactly return this value for the watch-methods and -1 for the count-methods.

• For the watch functions:
  • If the input was None, you are expected to return None (null is equivalent to None in Python)
  • If the input was an empty string '', you are expected to return an empty string ''
• The count functions will only ever return -1, if the input string is None or an empty string ''.

Also, Your code example makes no sense to me? The input argument for the two count functions is a single string of characters or None, not an integer.

if characters == None:  # if you want to do this in Python, you should use 'if characters is None:'
    return None  # this is supposed to return -1

if characters == empty:  # where does this 'empty' variable come from? do you mean "if characters == '':" ?
    return empty  # this is supposed to return -1

characters = str(characters)  # characters is already a string (and if it was None, it would have been caught above), why would you want to convert a string into a string?

# if you turn 'characters' into a string in the line before (even though it's already a string), why are you now checking if it is an integer?
if type(characters) == int:   # you should use 'if isinstance(characters, int):'
    return ""  # this is supposed to return -1

I would try to help if you can be more specific about your problem. By specific I mean:

• Post the exact solution code that you were using when you got this error (I mean the whole thing, all 4 functions)
• Post the exact error that you received and specifically what you don't like/understand about it
• If you do this, make sure to check the box Mark as having spoiler content underneath your comment (so you don't give away the solution to other users)

Thanks!

Really?

you gave a negative ranking because you do not like the error message?
are you serious?

I don't see where is the problem...
What is your concrete problem?

Is this why you gave a negative ranking?

Issue?
Where is the problem?