Main point: you can use helper functions (in particular, we use the findLetter() function a lot here) if you include that helper function in the CodingBat window.
# CodingBat homework # --------------------------------- def countLetter(string,letter): count = 0 for i in range(len(string)): if string[i] == letter: count += 1 return count # ---------------------------------- # we can use the helper function findLetter() here, so # we just define it below countVowels() def countVowels(s): vowels = 'aeiouAEIOU' count = 0 for i in range(len(s)): if findLetter(vowels,s[i]) >= 0: count += 1 return count def findLetter(string,letter): for i in range(len(string)): if string[i] == letter: return i return -1 # ------------------------------------ def isConsonant(c): lower = 'abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz' upper = 'ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ' vowels = 'aeiouAEIOU' # test if the character is a letter: if findLetter(lower,c) >= 0 or findLetter(upper,c) >= 0: # and if so, is it not a vowel? if findLetter(vowels,c) < 0: return True return False # --------------------------------------- def countWord(original,word): ln = len(word) count = 0 for i in range(len(original)): if original[i:i+ln] == word: count += 1 return count # --------------------------------- def noVowels(s): answer = '' vowels = 'aeiouAEIOU' for i in range(len(s)): if findLetter(vowels,s[i]) < 0: answer += s[i] return answer