What's the pythonic way of conditional variable initialization?

Question

Due to the scoping rules of Python, all variables once initialized within a scope are available thereafter. Since conditionals do not introduce new scope, constructs in other l

Answer 1

Python also has a very useful if syntax pattern which you can use here

  message = get_other_message() if optional_var else get_message()

Or if you want to compare strictly with None

  message = get_other_message() if optional_var is not None else get_message()

Unlike with example 1) you posted this doesn't call get_message() unnecessarily.