Converting a list of tuples into a dict

l = [
('a', 1),
('a', 2),
('a', 3),
('b', 1),
('b', 2),
('c', 1),
]

d = {}
for x, y in l:
    d.setdefault(x, []).append(y)
print d

produces:

{'a': [1, 2, 3], 'c': [1], 'b': [1, 2]}

A solution using groupby

from itertools import groupby
l = [('a',1), ('a', 2),('a', 3),('b', 1),('b', 2),('c', 1),]
[(label, [v for l,v in value]) for (label, value) in groupby(l, lambda x:x[0])]

Output:

[('a', [1, 2, 3]), ('b', [1, 2]), ('c', [1])]

groupby(l, lambda x:x[0]) gives you an iterator that contains

['a', [('a', 1), ...], c, [('c', 1)], ...]

Slightly simpler...

from collections import defaultdict

fq = defaultdict(list)
for n, v in myList:
    fq[n].append(v)
    
print(fq) # defaultdict(<type 'list'>, {'a': [1, 2, 3], 'c': [1], 'b': [1, 2]})