How can I tell when a string is in fact a number?

[William Park]

On Sun, Nov 05, 2000 at 02:50:16PM +0000, Gaute B Strokkenes wrote:
> 
> I've been using Python for something slightly more complicated than
> simple 'Hello World' programs for the first time in my life.  I find
> it very comfortable, but on the other hand I've also got this snippet
> in my program:
> 
> def isanum(str):
>     # FIXME: Surely there must be a sane way of doing this.
>     from string import find, digits
>     for i in range(len(str)):
>         if find(digits, str[i]) == -1:
>             return 0
>     return 1
> 
> As the comment says, I'm sure there must be a more straightforward way
> to do this.  However, I can't find out how, though I'm sure that it is
> really my relative unfamiliarity with Python that is to blame.

Try
    if re.search(str, '\D') == None:  return 1
    else:  return 0
where
    '\D' is non-digit (complement to '\d').

---William Park, Open Geometry Consulting