counting_words.py

# Function that takes as input a string and returns the number of words in the string. 
def count_words(a_string):
    counter = 0
    ready = True
    for char in a_string:
        if char == ' ':
            ready = True
        else:
            if ready:
                counter += 1
                ready = False
    return counter




def main():
    passage =("The number of orderings of the 52 cards in a deck of cards "
    "is so great that if every one of the almost 7 billion people alive "
    "today dealt one ordering of the cards per second, it would take "
    "2.5 * 10**40 times the age of the universe to order the cards in every "
    "possible way.")

    s = ''
    
    print(count_words(passage))
    print(count_words(s))
    #>>>56    

if __name__ == '__main__':
    main()