passing multiple strings to string.find()

[Bengt Richter]

On Thu, 07 Aug 2003 23:35:55 -0400, hokiegal99 <hokiegal99 at vt.edu> wrote:

>How do I say:
>
>x = string.find(files, 'this', 'that', 'the-other')
>
>currently I have to write it like this to make it work:
>
>x = string.find(files, 'this')
>y = string.find(files, 'that')
>z = string.find(files, 'the-other')
>

You might try the re module, e.g.,

 >>> import re
 >>> rxo = re.compile(r'this|that|the-other')
 >>> pos = 0
 >>> while 1:
 ...     m = rxo.search(' Find this or the-other or that and this.', pos)
 ...     if not m: break
 ...     print '%4s: %s' % (m.start(), m.group())
 ...     pos = m.end()
 ...
    6: this
   14: the-other
   27: that
   36: this

If some search strings have a common prefix, you'll have to put
the longest first in the regex, since re grabs the first match it sees.

Regards,
Bengt Richter