Trying to simplify lots of repetitive reading and writing in a script of mine, and I can not figure out how to get data out of def readfile.

def writefile(FILE, DATA):file = open(FILE, "w")X = str(DATA) file.write(X)file.close()def readfile(FILE):file = open(FILE, "r")readvar = file.read()file.close()readfile("BAL.txt")
print(readvar)

I would expect the value stored in BAL.txt to come back, but it always says that readvar is not defined. I just defined it in a function that I ran.

Error:

---------------------------------------------------------------------------
NameError                                 Traceback (most recent call last)
<ipython-input-6-f80fb5b2da05> in <module>14 15 readfile("test.txt")
---> 16 print(readvar)NameError: name 'readvar' is not defined

• In Python, variables from inside a function are generally not accessible from the outside (Look up variable scoping).
• You can put a return statement at the end of a function to return variables (readvar in this case) (and you almost always should).
• Then you can assign the returned argument (readvar) to a new variable (e.g. rv).
• You can also give it the same name.
• Other Resources:
  • Python Scopes and Namespaces
  • Real Python: Defining Your Own Python Function

def writefile(FILE, DATA):file = open(FILE, "w")X = str(DATA) file.write(X)file.close()def readfile(FILE):file = open(FILE, "r")readvar = file.read()file.close()return readvarrv = readfile("BAL.txt")
print(rv)