regexp matching end of line or comma

[MRAB]

On 25/11/2010 14:40, Jean-Michel Pichavant wrote:
> Hy guys,
>
> I'm struggling matching patterns ending with a comma ',' or an end of
> line '$'.
>
> import re
>
> ex1 = 'sumthin,'
> ex2 = 'sumthin'
> m1 = re.match('(?P<something>\S+),', ex1)
> m2 = re.match('(?P<something>\S+)$', ex2)
> m3 = re.match('(?P<something>\S+)[,$]', ex1)
> m4 = re.match('(?P<something>\S+)[,$]', ex2)
>
> print m1, m2
> print m3
> print m4
>
> <_sre.SRE_Match object at 0x8834de0> <_sre.SRE_Match object at 0x8834e20>
> <_sre.SRE_Match object at 0x8834e60>
> None
>
> My problem is that m4 is None while I'd like it to match ex2.
>
> Any clue ?
>
Within a character set '$' is a literal '$' and not end-of-string, just
as '\b' is '\x08' and not word-boundary.

Use a lookahead instead:

     >>> re.match('(?P<something>\S+)(?=,|$)', ex1)
     <_sre.SRE_Match object at 0x01719FA0>
     >>> re.match('(?P<something>\S+)(?=,|$)', ex2)
     <_sre.SRE_Match object at 0x016937E0>