Plus Minus Sanity

Testing Python syntax and operator precedence knowledge

This is a medium-difficulty code-reading question that tests your grasp of Python's operator precedence and unary operators. Rather than asking you to write code, it asks you to predict what a short snippet will output—a skill that matters when debugging trading systems or reviewing a colleague's logic under time pressure.

The question hinges on understanding how Python parses expressions involving unary plus and minus operators, and how they interact with other constructs in the language. Getting this right requires mental execution of the code rather than pattern matching, which is why it separates candidates who truly understand operator semantics from those who merely memorize syntax rules.

• Unary operator precedence vs. binary operators
• Python's handling of signed literals and expressions
• Mental code execution and prediction