The int() function converts the sequence of number characters into a number, known as (integer) type casting.

y = int(input("Enter a number please: ") )    
x = 2 * y
print(x)

The terminal prompt will be expecting a user input, type any number you wish. e.g. 23

Output will be 2*23 = 46. In this case the interpreter uses the same * operator to multiply numbers, as the variable y contains a numeric value, and the result stored in the xvariable is also a numeric value.

The int() function is independent of the input() function:

text_variable = "25" 

z = int(text_variable)

print(2 * z);

and it can convert a text consisting of a legitimate number representation to an integer value, as in values passed to remote web services, etc.

y = int(input("Enter a number please: ") )
x = 2 * y
print(x)

text_variable = "25"
z = int(text_variable)
print(2 * z)

Some more examples:

age = input("Enter your age please: ")
print(age)

This will output your age as a string literal "17"

print(age * 2)

This will output your age as a string literal "1717"

age = int (input("Enter a number please: ") )    
print(age)

This will output your age as the number 17, as a number without the quotation marks

print(age * 2)

This will output your age as the number 34

The prompt message of the input() function is a string literal that we can generate by concatenating other strings and variables.

name = input("Enter your name please: ")
print("Hello",name) 

age = int ( input("Hi " + name + " Please enter your age : "))
print(age)

Type Casting

The basic type casting methods can be listed as:

• int() : Generates integers from floating point numbers or appropriate string literals,
• float() : Generates decimal numbers from integers, or appropriate string literals,
• str() : Generates string literals from integers or floating point numbers.