#!/usr/bin/env python2 def binsearch(a, v, left, right): mid = (right-left)/2 + left if mid > right: return 0 if a[mid] == v: return 1 elif v > a[mid]: return binsearch(a, v, mid+1, right) elif v < a[mid]: return binsearch(a, v, left, mid-1) a = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5 , 7, 8, 9, 10, 11] print binsearch(a, 10, 0, len(a)-1)