Print function in python not working with web scraping

Question

I'm getting a string by scraping a certain website, then I'm trying to check if the first value of that string (in this case it's " <h2>maanantai 10.1.</h2> " contains the letter 'a'. If it does (like it does) - print 'YES'.

For some reason which I don't understand it just doesn't work.

import urllib.request
from bs4 import BeautifulSoup

url = 'https://kouluruoka.fi/menu/kouvola_koulujenruokalista'

request = urllib.request.Request(url)
content = urllib.request.urlopen(request)

parse = BeautifulSoup(content, 'html.parser')

h2_elements = parse.find_all('h2')

first_value_in_string = h2_elements[1]

# this one prints " <h2>maanantai 10.1.</h2> " as it should
print(first_value_in_string)

# this one should check if the value (first_value_in_string) contains the letter 'a' and if it does then print 'YES' but for some reason it doesnt
if 'a' in first_value_in_string:
    print('YES')

'a' in " <h2>maanantai 10.1.</h2> " returns True, so are you sure about your debugging, for example is first_value_in_string actually a string? — jarmod
– jarmod, Commented Jan 13, 2022 at 17:52
Does this answer your question? How to get a html text inside tag using BeautifulSoup — Tomerikoo
– Tomerikoo, Commented Jan 13, 2022 at 18:02

eshirvana · Accepted Answer · 2022-01-13 18:06:28Z

3

first_value_in_string data type is <class 'bs4.element.Tag'> so cast it to string when you compare or better get the text attribute:

if 'a' in first_value_in_string.text:
    print('YES')

or when you assign it :

first_value_in_string = h2_elements[1].text

alternatively you can use .string attribute

edited Jan 13, 2022 at 18:06

answered Jan 13, 2022 at 17:54

eshirvana

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1 Comment

gen_Eric Over a year ago

You can also do first_value_in_string.string.

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