How do I pass variables across functions? [duplicate]

This is what is actually happening:

global_list = []

def defineAList():
    local_list = ['1','2','3']
    print "For checking purposes: in defineAList, list is", local_list 
    return local_list 

def useTheList(passed_list):
    print "For checking purposes: in useTheList, list is", passed_list

def main():
    # returned list is ignored
    returned_list = defineAList()   

    # passed_list inside useTheList is set to global_list
    useTheList(global_list) 

main()

This is what you want:

def defineAList():
    local_list = ['1','2','3']
    print "For checking purposes: in defineAList, list is", local_list 
    return local_list 

def useTheList(passed_list):
    print "For checking purposes: in useTheList, list is", passed_list

def main():
    # returned list is ignored
    returned_list = defineAList()   

    # passed_list inside useTheList is set to what is returned from defineAList
    useTheList(returned_list) 

main()

You can even skip the temporary returned_list and pass the returned value directly to useTheList:

def main():
    # passed_list inside useTheList is set to what is returned from defineAList
    useTheList(defineAList()) 

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