How can I parse a string ['FED590498'] in python, so than I can get all numeric values 590498 and chars FED separately.
Some Samples:
['ICIC889150']
['FED889150']
['MFL541606']
and [ ] is not part of string...
2 Answers
If the number of letters is variable, it's easiest to use a regular expression:
import re
characters, numbers = re.search(r'([A-Z]+)(\d+)', inputstring).groups()
This assumes that:
- The letters are uppercase ASCII
- There is at least 1 character, and 1 digit in each input string.
You can lock the pattern down further by using {3, 4} instead of + to limit repetition to just 3 or 4 instead of at least 1, etc.
Demo:
>>> import re
>>> inputstring = 'FED590498'
>>> characters, numbers = re.search(r'([A-Z]+)(\d+)', inputstring).groups()
>>> characters
'FED'
>>> numbers
'590498'
answered Mar 18, 2014 at 11:50
Martijn Pieters
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3 Comments
PK10
Thanks Martijn Pieters
Matt
Out of curiosity, is it more idiomatic to use
re.search in combination with groups or re.findall with [0]?
Martijn Pieters
@Matt: I'd use
re.search() here if it is an error for there to be more than one such pattern in the input string.Given the requirement that there are always 3 or 4 letters you can use:
import re
characters, numbers = re.findall(r'([A-Z]{3,4})(\d+)', 'FED590498')[0]
characters, numbers
#('FED', '590498')
Or even:
ids = ['ICIC889150', 'FED889150', 'MFL541606']
[re.search(r'([A-Z]{3,4})(\d+)', id).groups() for id in ids]
#[('ICIC', '889150'), ('FED', '889150'), ('MFL', '541606')]
As suggested by Martjin, search is the preferred way.
[,]brackets part of the string, are the quotes?