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Pattern Matching Using Search and Escape Codes

Pattern Matching Using Search and Escape Codes

Let's dig into some pattern matching using regular expressions and how escape codes can be helpful.

Let’s take a moment to learn some pattern matching basics. When using Python to look for a pattern in a string, we can use the search function like we did in the previous lesson.

Pattern matching with search()

Here’s how:

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import re
text = "The ants go marching one by one"
strings = ['the', 'one']
for string in strings:
    match = re.search(string, text)
    if match:
        print('Found "{}" in "{}"'.format(string, text))
        text_pos = match.span()
        print(text[match.start():match.end()])
    else:
        print('Did not find "{}"'.format(string))

For this example, we import the re module and create a ...