Python regex string matching?

Question

I'm having a hell of a time trying to transfer my experience with javascript regex to Python.

I'm just trying to get this to work:

print(re.match('e','test'))

...but it prints None. If I do:

print(re.match('e','est'))

It matches... does it by default match the beginning of the string? When it does match, how do I use the result?

How do I make the first one match? Is there better documentation than the python site offers?

Oscar Korz · Accepted Answer · 2011-09-30 23:21:28Z

59

re.match implicitly adds ^ to the start of your regex. In other words, it only matches at the start of the string.

re.search will retry at all positions.

Generally speaking, I recommend using re.search and adding ^ explicitly when you want it.

http://docs.python.org/library/re.html

answered Sep 30, 2011 at 23:21

Oscar Korz

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Kent · Accepted Answer · 2011-09-30 23:25:32Z

9

the docs is clear i think.

re.match(pattern, string[, flags])¶
If zero or more characters **at the beginning of string** match the
regular expression pattern, return a corresponding MatchObject instance. Return None if the string does not match the pattern; note that this is different from a zero-length match.

answered Sep 30, 2011 at 23:25

Kent

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