Python Regex Expression that finds variable string between whitespace, punctuation and/ or string end

Question

I need the regex expression to find a substring (it’s a variable) that is either preceded/followed by punctuation, whitespaces or the start/end of the string. I don’t know the size or content of the substring. I’ve come up with [?.!- ]1abc[?.!- ] (this is a specific example where the substring is 1abc) but I don’t know how to add start/end as a possibility. With the following list:

"1abc"
"2131abc2411abc"
"Hausstrasse 1abc"
"Parkallee 1abc "
"1abc-2"
"abc-def-1abc!"

I’d want the matches to be on all lines but not "2131abc2411abc". Alternatively I tried the pattern [?.!- ]*1abc[?.!- ]* but with this, "2131abc2411abc" returns matches also.

Could someone help me out?

Asked By: AnnemarieWittig

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Answer 1

Directly use (^|[?.!- ]) to match one of the boundary characters or the start of the string. For the end, use $.

In addition, directly use 1abc to match that substring literally rather than putting it into a character class which matches only one character from the set.

re.search(r'(^|[?.!- ])1abc([?.!- ]|$)', s)

Answered By: Unmitigated

Python Regex Expression that finds variable string between whitespace, punctuation and/ or string end

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