Calculator for basic arithmetic operations

Question

Second day coding so I'm new to this. I have made this simple calculator but I repeat the code in order to use the previous answer in the next calculation. I've been trying to simplify it but I can't seem to figure it out. Whatever I try breaks the code. Any feed back helps. Here is the code

# Beginning calculator code
first_number = "a"
second_number = ""
carry_number = ""
operation = ""
while first_number == "a":
    first_number = float(input("Enter your first number: "))
    operation = input("You can enter c to exit calculator \nWhat operation? ")
    second_number = float(input("What is your second number? "))
    if operation == "+":
        carry_number = (first_number + second_number)
    elif operation == "-":
        carry_number = (first_number - second_number)
    elif operation == "/":
        carry_number = (first_number / second_number)
    elif operation == "*":
        carry_number = (first_number * second_number)



    print(first_number, operation, second_number, "=", carry_number)
    first_number = carry_number
while True:
    operation = input("You can enter c to exit calculator \nWhat operation? ")
    if operation == "c":
        quit()
    second_number = float(input("What is your second number? "))
    if operation == "+":
        carry_number = (first_number + second_number)
    elif operation == "-":
        carry_number = (first_number - second_number)
    elif operation == "/":
        carry_number = (first_number / second_number)
    elif operation == "*":
        carry_number = (first_number * second_number)

    print(first_number, operation, second_number, "=", carry_number)
    first_number = carry_number

Welcome and thanks for joining CodeReview! I hope that you get some good feedback; this is a great first question. — Reinderien
– Reinderien, Commented Jun 25, 2021 at 15:19

Reinderien · Accepted Answer · 2021-06-25 15:32:20Z

Notice that you have a bunch of repeated code; let's reduce this
There's no need to pre-initialize your variables in the first five lines of your code
Your first while loop doesn't deserve to exist; the condition is only evaluated True once
No need to surround your operations in parens

There's a lot of other things you could do to improve this, but without getting too advanced, you could write this to be as simple as

# Beginning calculator code

first_number = float(input('Enter your first number: '))

while True:
    print('You can enter c to exit calculator')
    operation = input('What operation? ')
    if operation == 'c':
        quit()
        
    second_number = float(input('What is your second number? '))
    if operation == '+':
        carry_number = first_number + second_number
    elif operation == '-':
        carry_number = first_number - second_number
    elif operation == '/':
        carry_number = first_number / second_number
    elif operation == '*':
        carry_number = first_number * second_number

    print(first_number, operation, second_number, '=', carry_number)
    first_number = carry_number

First off thank you for the explanation. It made sense to me right away when you wrote it like that. So when you said I don't need to pre-initialize the variables you meant the lines that I wrote "first number = second number = etc..". The program automatically can keep track of the values? — crazyrocky
– crazyrocky, Commented Jun 25, 2021 at 17:20
Lines like first_number = "a" that get overwritten before they're read. — Reinderien
– Reinderien, Commented Jun 25, 2021 at 17:21

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