Ignore text from dot to a specific character with regex python

Question

I have a text like this:

text = "Text1.
        Textt « text2 »
        Some other text"

i want a regex code that is able to delete the text inside the quotes and the text before it till the dot.

so the output be like that :

text = "Text1.
    Some other text"

the code am stuck into :

text= re.sub(r'\s*.*?»', '', text)

what the code actually does is delete a more than expected here's an example :

text="Text1.
        Textt « text2 »
        Some other text
        Textt « text3 »
        other text"

the output i get is like this :

text="Text1.
    other text"

You probably want \..*?» as your RE, with the re.DOTALL option enabled so that .*? also matches newlines. — joanis
– joanis, Commented Mar 30, 2021 at 21:34
Your code seems to work, could you explain the difference between the actual and the expected output ? — azro
– azro, Commented Mar 30, 2021 at 21:35
the code seems to work but i have a long text and it deletes a lot of text, so i thought something wrong with it — Adil kasbaoui
– Adil kasbaoui, Commented Mar 30, 2021 at 21:37

anubhava · Accepted Answer · 2021-03-30 21:37:04Z

2

You may use:

import re

text = '''Text1.
       Textt « text2 »
       Some other text'''

text = re.sub(r'\.[^«]*«[^»]*»', '.', text)

print (text)

To get this output:

Text1.
    Some other text

RegEx Demo

RegEx Explained:

\.: Match a dot
[^«]*: Match 0 or more characters that are not «
«: Match a «
[^»]*: Match 0 or more characters that are not »
»: Match a »

We just replace this matched text with a single dot to get our desired output.

answered Mar 30, 2021 at 21:37

anubhava

790k67 gold badges603 silver badges671 bronze badges

Sign up to request clarification or add additional context in comments.

Comments

Wiktor Stribiżew · Accepted Answer · 2021-03-30 21:55:27Z

1

You can use

re.sub(r'(\.)[^.]*«[^«»]*»', r'\1', text)

See the regex demo.

(\.) - Group 1 (\1 in the replacement refers to this captured value): a dot
[^.]* - zero or more chars other than a .
«[^«»]*» - a substring between « and » without other « and » inside.

See a Python demo:

import re
text = "Text1.\n        Textt « text2 »\n        Some other text"
print( re.sub(r'(\.)[^.]*«[^«»]*»', r'\1', text) )

edited Mar 30, 2021 at 21:55

answered Mar 30, 2021 at 21:33

Wiktor Stribiżew

631k41 gold badges502 silver badges632 bronze badges

4 Comments

Wiktor Stribiżew Over a year ago

@AdilKasbaoui Ok, you edited the question and now it is rather unclear. (\.)[\s\S]*«[^«»]*» would work for your example, but not sure it will work for the real input. The final solution will probably need to rely on more context.

Wiktor Stribiżew Over a year ago

@AdilKasbaoui It seems you need to add actual rules to explain what needs to be done.

Wiktor Stribiżew Over a year ago

@AdilKasbaoui Then use re.sub(r'(\.)[^.]*«[^«»]*»', r'\1', text), the answer is corrected.

Wiktor Stribiżew Over a year ago

@AdilKasbaoui Yes, it is easy: re.sub(r'([.?!])[^?!.]*«[^«»]*»', r'\1', text). I suspected this follow-up, that is my solution is based on a capturing group + backreference, it can be expanded.

ani · Accepted Answer · 2021-03-30 21:37:51Z

1

Alternatively, you can use split

text = "Text1. Textt « text2 » Some other text"

text = text.split('«')[0].split('.')+'.' + text.split('»')[1] 

print(text)

output:

"Text1. Some other text"

answered Mar 30, 2021 at 21:37

ani

5583 silver badges16 bronze badges

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

Ignore text from dot to a specific character with regex python

3 Answers 3

Comments

4 Comments

Comments

Your Answer

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

3 Answers 3

Comments

4 Comments

Comments

Your Answer

Sign up or log in

Post as a guest

Related