Using input() in a def function

Question

I am attempting to create a contact list with a def() function to easily loop back to the top later in the code. The issue I am having is that I define "function_question" in the def portion but when I run the code it gives me a NameError saying "function_question" is not defined. Any help or suggestions is appreciated!!

#Created a def so I can easily run back the code to the top. 
def user_prompt():
  print('Welcome to your contact directory.')
  function_question = int(input("What would you like to do? \n1  Add Conctact \n2  Find Contact \n3  Edit Contact \n4  Delete Contact:"))

user_prompt()

#Adding a contact to the contact list. 
while function_question == 1:
  name = input('What is the persons name? ')
  phone_number = input('What is the phone number? ')
  email = input('What is your email? ')
  address = input('What is the person adress? ')
  if len(phone_number) != 10:
    phone_number = input("the phone number you provided is not the proper length. Re-enter:")
  contact = [] + [name] + [phone_number] + [email] + [address]
  contact_list.append(contact)
  ans = input('Would you like to add another contact? ')
  if ans == 'yes':
    continue 
  if ans == 'no':
    user_prompt()

Answer 1

You could simply return the value from the function and save it to a variable outside the function. Like:

def user_prompt():
  print('Welcome to your contact directory.')
  return int(input("question"))

input_question = user_prompt()

Answer 2

The issue is that the variable function_question is empty. In your code you defined two variables function_question with the same name but with different memory address; the first is a local variable that works only into the user_prompt() function. The correct code is:

#Created a def so I can easily run back the code to the top. 
def user_prompt():
  print('Welcome to your contact directory.')
  return int(input("What would you like to do? \n1  Add Conctact \n2  Find Contact \n3  Edit Contact \n4  Delete Contact:"))

function_question = user_prompt()

#Adding a contact to the contact list. 
while function_question == 1:
  ...

I suggest you to search about python scope variable for more details.

Answer 3

The function_question variable is in the scope of the user_prompt function so you cannot use it in the global scope. You need to make it global for it to be acessible I reccomend reading through this, https://www.w3schools.com/PYTHON/python_scope.asp