Splitting a variable length string into multiple parts in python

Question

I have a database:

As you can see in the 'desc' column, the text is of variable length (meaning no two strings I pull from this database are going to be of the same length). I will eventually add many more entries to this database, but this is what I'm testing with and starting with at the moment.

Right now, I have the following python code to grab these blocks of string and display them:

cmd = input(Enter command:)
sql = "SELECT cmd,`desc` FROM table WHERE cmd = '"+ cmd +"'"
cursor.execute(sql)
result = cursor.fetchall()
for row in result:
    print("Command: "+ row[0] +":\n")
    print("Description: "+ row[1][:40] +"\n")
    if (len(row[1]) > 40):
       print(row[1][40:85])
    if (len(row[1]) > 85):
       print(row[1][85:130])
    if (len(row[1]) > 130):
       print(row[1][130:165])
    if (len(row[1]) > 165):
       print(row[1][165:])

The splitting here works to an extent, for example:

Command: close:
Description: This command will create a 'close' butto
n in the message window for the invoking char
acter. If no window is currently on screen, t
he script execution will end.

As you can see with the example above of the output, the split causes some characters to get cut off in mid word. Given the fact that the strings could be of any length between say...20 total characters and up to 190ish, and I want to split the string into chunks of say...8 words each because of space constraints, how would I go about doing this?

use parameter substitution instead of manually constructing sql string e.g., cursor.execute('select * from commands where cmd=?', (cmd,)). You don't need to call cursor.fetchall() you could iterate over it directly: for row in cursor: ... — jfs
– jfs, Commented Jan 16, 2012 at 0:18

DSM · Accepted Answer · 2012-01-15 23:17:58Z

16

Check out the textwrap module.

>>> import textwrap
>>> 
>>> s = "This command will create a 'close' button in the message window for the invoking character. If no window is currently on screen, the script execution will end."
>>> 
>>> wrapped = textwrap.wrap(s, 40)
>>> 
>>> for line in wrapped:
...     print line
... 
This command will create a 'close'
button in the message window for the
invoking character. If no window is
currently on screen, the script
execution will end.

You can do a lot of configuration of TextWrapper.

answered Jan 15, 2012 at 23:17

DSM

355k67 gold badges606 silver badges504 bronze badges

Sign up to request clarification or add additional context in comments.

3 Comments

senderle Over a year ago

This exists?! The python standard libraries never stop surprising me. +1

Jguy Over a year ago

I was working on a dirty trick to get the job done. I had no idea something like this was available. I'll definitely take a look once I get the chance. Thanks!

Jguy Over a year ago

It's quick and it gets the job done. That's all I was looking for :)

JustinDanielson · Accepted Answer · 2012-01-15 23:15:26Z

2

Split on spaces to separate words, then join 8 at a time with a space as the separator.

content = "This is some sentence that has more than eight words"
content = content.split(" ")
print content
['This', 'is', 'some', 'sentence', 'that', 'has', 'more', 'than', 'eight', 'words']
print(" ".join(content[0:8]))
This is some sentence that has more than

answered Jan 15, 2012 at 23:15

JustinDanielson

3,1851 gold badge21 silver badges26 bronze badges

1 Comment

Jguy Over a year ago

Thanks! This was what I was looking for, for now.

joaquin · Accepted Answer · 2012-01-15 23:24:57Z

1

Cut by words instead of characters using python textwrap module:

>>> import textwrap
>>> text = 'asdd sdfdf asdsg asfgfhj'
>>> s = textwrap.wrap(text, width=10)  # <- example 10 characters
>>> s
['asdd sdfdf', 'asdsg', 'asfgfhj']
>>> print '\n'.join(s)
asdd sdfdf
asdsg
asfgfhj
>>>

edited Jan 15, 2012 at 23:24

answered Jan 15, 2012 at 23:15

joaquin

86k31 gold badges146 silver badges155 bronze badges

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

Splitting a variable length string into multiple parts in python

3 Answers 3

3 Comments

1 Comment

Comments

Your Answer

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

3 Answers 3

3 Comments

1 Comment

Comments

Your Answer

Sign up or log in

Post as a guest

Related