-1 on the first post.
[l.strip() as stripped for l in text.split('\n') if stripped != '']
This is equivalent, with respect to semantics as well as efficiency, to: [s for s in (l.strip() for l in text.split('\n')) if s != ''] And, even easier to read: stripped = (l.strip() for l in text.split('\n')) non_null_lines = [s for s in stripped if s] # let's use the implicit truth value too It seems to me that there's too much being asked for here when the tools are already all available. Generator expressions/list comprehensions seem to be getting a lot of attention from python-ideas lately, when it's really making the code _harder_ to read, and not even easier to write, because of all the extra thinking required. In fact, most of these things are better done with straight-out looping and yielding: for line in text.split('\n'): stripped = l.strip() if stripped: yield stripped Now _that_ I can read! -- Cheers, Leif