Morning, is there a way to compute a variable within a python block? 

something equal to this [compute flag=1]

i was thinking spss.Submit[compute flag=1] but am getting an error.  Thanks Art

A Python function is called with (rounded) parantheses, the SPSS command to execute is a delimited string for Python, and SPSS commands are generally terminated by a full stop. Try

spss.Submit('compute flag=1 .')

If you need the effect immediatly, you may append

spss.Submit('execute .')

It's true that the command(s) need to be quoted, but the Submit function will automatically append a period if one is not present.  The argument can be a Python list or a simple string.