Find the second smallest number in a list using recursion

Question

I know there has been a question asked on this topic, but none of the answers have helped me. I don\'t need help with implementing the code, I just need help sorting through the

Answer 1

You can use a flag to keep track whether you're in the most outer level of the calls.

def second_smallest(numbers, top_level=True):
    # Do your stuff and call `second_smallest(numbers[1:], False)` for any recursions.
    # When it comes to returning a value from the function, use the following.

    if top_level:
        return result[0]   # what your function ultimately returns
    return result          # [second, first] since you're still in recursive calls