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<div><font color="#1F497D">I believe I had epiphany:</font></div>
<div><font color="#1F497D"> </font></div>
<div><font color="#1F497D"> test = re.compile('MAT file (billing|carrier|log|util)' r'\\' '\d{8} deleted')</font></div>
<div><font face="Calibri, sans-serif" size="2" color="#1F497D"> </font></div>
<div><font color="#1F497D">is this correct?</font></div>
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<div><font face="Tahoma, sans-serif" size="2">_____________________________________________<br>
<b>From:</b> Yaniga, Frank <br>
<b>Sent:</b> Wednesday, January 12, 2011 8:20 AM<br>
<b>To:</b> 'tutor@python.org'; 'help@python.org'<br>
<b>Subject:</b> question regarding regular expression compile</font></div>
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<div style="margin-bottom: 10pt; "><font face="Calibri, sans-serif" size="2"> </font></div>
<div>I am determining a regular expression that can recognize the any of the following strings:</div>
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<div style="padding-left: 72pt; ">MAT file log\20101225 deleted</div>
<div style="padding-left: 72pt; ">MAT file billing\20101225 deleted</div>
<div style="padding-left: 72pt; ">MAT file util\20101225 deleted</div>
<div style="padding-left: 72pt; ">MAT file carrier\20101225 deleted</div>
<div><font face="Calibri, sans-serif" size="2"> </font></div>
<div>I begin by creating a regular expression object so that I can reuse it in multiple operations:</div>
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<div> test = re.compile(‘MAT file </div>
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<div>for log, billing, util, and carrier I use an arbitrary match:</div>
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<div> (log|billing|util|carrier)</div>
<div> </div>
<div>for 20101225 I use decimal digit with repetition match:</div>
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<div> \d{8}</div>
<div> </div>
<div>and finish with:</div>
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<div> delete’)</div>
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<div> </div>
<div>My question is how do I handle the backslash (NOTE: the match must only be a backslash)?</div>
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