Adding Unique Entries

Create a program that will read in a JSON database file, then add an entry using user input, the overwrite the file saving that new entry.

The database is a single dictionary composed of student dictionaries. A dict of dicts. Each key in the database dictionary is a student_id and the value is a student dictionary.

Once loaded into Python it would look like:

students = {
    "188759": {
        "name": "Neli Kustner",
        "grade": 12,
        "student_id": 188759,
        "points": 1878
    },
    "105277": {
        "name": "Carolien Amador",
        "grade": 12,
        "student_id": 105277,
        "points": 1416
    }
}

What you should do

1. Create a main function along with an if __name__ == "__main__" guard.

2. Ask the user to enter a new student. Be sure to include name, grade, student_id, points.

3. Write the new database dictionary to the original file.

4. Create a function called is_unique. It will take a dictionary (the database) as well as a student_id. The purpose is to loop through the database dictionary’s .keys() and return True if the given student_id is not in the database already. Essentially, if the id is unique, it returns True. Write a docstring for this function.

5. Use the is_unique function and disallow any user input that contains a duplicate student_id. More points for using the function in a validation loop. Keep the user trapped in the validation loop until they enter a usable student_id.

   Add a new student
   
   student_id: 12345
   Error: Student ID already in database.
   student_id: 12345
   Error: Student ID already in database.
   student_id: 12345
   Error: Student ID already in database.
   student_id: 99999
   name: Frank McGill
   ...
   

You can use the following file that is a JSON dictionary of student dictionaries referenced by their student ID.

• students-by-id.json

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©2021 Daniel Gallo

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