Python Regex on comma, space

Question

Say I have a string "Dogs,cats". If I do re.split(r'[,]*', 'Dogs,cats'), then I get ['Dogs', 'cats'], and this is good, but if I get 'Dogs, cats', then I get a list ['Dogs', ' cats'] and this is bad. How to I make my regex pattern match either having a comma with no space or with a space to still give me ['Dogs', 'cats']?

I tried re.split(r'[\s,]*', 'Dogs,cats') and while that works here, it gives an unwanted splitting in the cases where I have a say, 'dogs,cats are Happy'.

Tim Pietzcker · Accepted Answer · 2013-08-27 17:51:09Z

5

Your first case doesn't even need a regex. You can simply do:

"Dogs,Cats".split(",")

For your 2nd case, you can use:

re.split(r',\s*', "Dogs, Cats")

edited Aug 27, 2013 at 17:51

Tim Pietzcker

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answered Aug 27, 2013 at 17:50

Rohit Jain

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3 Comments

Rohit Jain Over a year ago

@MartijnPieters. OOPs, mixed up with Java.

user1971598 Over a year ago

Yea, I used the split method previously, but the issue came up of having a space after the ,, which would mess up the result I wanted.

user1971598 Over a year ago

@RohitJain Awesome, worked. I'll accept when the ticker lets me. Thanks!

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