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Is there a way to find (potentially) multiple results with re.search?

While parsing file names of TV shows, I would like to extract information about them to use for renaming. I have a working model, but it currently uses 28 if/elif statements for every iteration of filename I've seen over the last few years. I'd love to be able to condense this to something that I'm not ashamed of, so any help would be appreciated.
Phase one of this code repentance is to hopefully grab multiple episode numbers. I've gotten as far as the code below, but in the first entry it only displays the first episode number and not all three.
import re
def main():
pattern = '(.*)\.S(\d+)[E(\d+)]+'
strings = ['blah.s01e01e02e03', 'foo.s09e09', 'bar.s05e05']
#print(strings)
for string in strings:
print(string)
result = re.search("(.*)\.S(\d+)[E(\d+)]+", string, re.IGNORECASE)
print(result.group(2))
if __name__== "__main__":
main()
This outputs:
blah.s01e01e02e03
01
foo.s09e09
09
bar.s05e05
05
It's probably trivial, but regular expressions might as well be Cuneiform most days. Thanks in advance!

No. You can use findall to find all e\d+, but it cannot find overlapping matches, which makes it impossible to use s\d+ together with it (i.e. you can't distinguish e02 in "foo.s01e006e007" from that of "age007.s01e001"), and Python doesn't let you use variable-length lookbehind (to make sure s\d+ is before it without overlapping).
The way to do this is to find \.s\d+((?:e\d+)+)$ then split the resultant group 1 in another step (whether by using findall with e\d+, or by splitting with (?<!^)(?=e)).
text = 'blah.s01e01e02e03'
match = re.search(r'\.(s\d+)((?:e\d+)+)$', text, re.I)
season = match.group(1)
episodes = re.findall(r'e\d+', match.group(2), re.I)
print(season, episodes)
# => s01 ['e01', 'e02', 'e03']

re.findall instead of re.search will return a list of all matches

If you can make use of the PyPi regex module you could make use of repeating capture groups in the pattern, and then use .captures()
For example:
import regex
s = "blah.s01e01e02e03"
pattern = r"\.(s\d+)(e\d+)+"
m = regex.search(pattern, s, regex.IGNORECASE)
if m:
print(m.captures(1)[0], m.captures(2))
Output:
s01 ['e01', 'e02', 'e03']
See a Python demo and a regex101 demo.
Or using .capturesdict () with named capture groups.
For example:
import regex
s = "blah.s01e01e02e03"
pattern = r"\.(?P<season>s\d+)(?P<episodes>e\d+)+"
m = regex.search(pattern, s, regex.IGNORECASE)
if m:
print(m.capturesdict())
Output:
{'season': ['s01'], 'episodes': ['e01', 'e02', 'e03']}
See a Python demo.
Note that the notation [E(\d+)] that you used is a character class, that matches 1 or the listed characters like E ( a digit + )

Combine compiled Python regexes

Is there any mechanism in Python for combining compiled regular expressions?
I know it's possible to compile a new expression by extracting the plain-old-string .pattern property from existing pattern objects. But this fails in several ways. For example:
import re
first = re.compile(r"(hello?\s*)")
# one-two-three or one/two/three - but not one-two/three or one/two-three
second = re.compile(r"one(?P<r1>[-/])two(?P=r1)three", re.IGNORECASE)
# Incorrect - back-reference \1 would refer to the wrong capturing group now,
# and we get an error "redefinition of group name 'r1' as group 3; was
# group 2 at position 47" for the `(?P)` group.
# Result is also now case-sensitive, unlike 'second' which is IGNORECASE
both = re.compile(first.pattern + second.pattern + second.pattern)
The result I'm looking for is achievable like so in Perl:
$first = qr{(hello?\s*)};
# one-two-three or one/two/three - but not one-two/three or one/two-three
$second = qr{one([-/])two\g{-1}three}i;
$both = qr{$first$second$second};
A test shows the results:
test($second, "...one-two-three..."); # Matches
test($both, "...hello one-two-THREEone-two-three..."); # Matches
test($both, "...hellone/Two/ThreeONE-TWO-THREE..."); # Matches
test($both, "...HELLO one/Two/ThreeONE-TWO-THREE..."); # No match
sub test {
my ($pat, $str) = #_;
print $str =~ $pat ? "Matches\n" : "No match\n";
}
Is there a library somewhere that makes this use case possible in Python? Or a built-in feature I'm missing somewhere?
(Note - one very useful feature in the Perl regex above is \g{-1}, which unambiguously refers to the immediately preceding capture group, so that there are no collisions of the type that Python is complaining about when I try to compile the combined expression. I haven't seen that anywhere in Python world, not sure if there's an alternative I haven't thought of.)

Ken, this is an interesting problem. I agree with you that the Perl solution is very slick.
I came up with something, but it is not so elegant. Maybe it gives you some idea to further explore the solution using Python. The idea is to simulate the concatenation using Python re methods.
first = re.compile(r"(hello?\s*)")
second = re.compile(r"one(?P<r1>[-/])two(?P=r1)three", re.IGNORECASE)
str="...hello one-two-THREEone/two/three..."
#str="...hellone/Two/ThreeONE-TWO-THREE..."
if re.search(first,str):
first_end_pos = re.search(first,str).end()
if re.match(second,str[first_end_pos:]):
second_end_pos = re.match(second,str[first_end_pos:]).end() + first_end_pos
if re.match(second,str[second_end_pos:]):
print ('Matches')
It will work for most of the cases but it is not working for the below case:
...hellone/Two/ThreeONE-TWO-THREE...
So, yes I admit it is not a complete solution to your problem. Hope this helps though.

I'm not a perl expert, but it doesn't seem like you're comparing apples to apples. You're using named capture groups in python, but I don't see any named capture groups in the perl example. This causes the error you mention, because this
both = re.compile(first.pattern + second.pattern + second.pattern)
tries to create two capture groups named r1
For example, if you use the regex below, then try to access group_one by name, would you get the numbers before "some text" or after?
# Not actually a valid regex
r'(?P<group_one>[0-9]*)some text(?P<group_one>[0-9]*)'
Solution 1
An easy solution is probably to remove the names from the capture groups. Also add the re.IGNORECASE to both. The code below works, although I'm not sure the resulting regex pattern will match what you want it to match.
first = re.compile(r"(hello?\s*)")
second = re.compile(r"one([-/])two([-/])three", re.IGNORECASE)
both = re.compile(first.pattern + second.pattern + second.pattern, re.IGNORECASE)
Solution 2
What I'd probably do instead is define the separate regular expressions as strings, then you can combine them however you'd like.
pattern1 = r"(hello?\s*)"
pattern2 = r"one([-/])two([-/])three"
first = re.compile(pattern1, re.IGNORECASE)
second = re.compile(pattern2, re.IGNORECASE)
both = re.compile(r"{}{}{}".format(pattern1, pattern2, pattern2), re.IGNORECASE)
Or better yet, for this specific example, don't repeat pattern2 twice, just account for the fact that it'll repeat in the regex:
both = re.compile("{}({}){{2}}".format(pattern1, pattern2), re.IGNORECASE)
which gives you the following regex:
r'(hello?\s*)(one([-/])two([-/])three){2}'

Python complex regex replace

I'm trying to do a simple VB6 to c translator to help me port an open source game to the c language.
I want to be able to get "NpcList[NpcIndex]" from "With Npclist[NpcIndex]" using ragex and to replace it everywhere it has to be replaced. ("With" is used as a macro in VB6 that adds Npclist[NpcIndex] when ever it needs to until it founds "End With")
Example:
With Npclist[NpcIndex]
.goTo(245) <-- it should be replaced with Npclist[NpcIndex].goTo(245)
End With
Is it possible to use regex to do the job?
I've tried using a function to perfom another regex replace between the "With" and the "End With" but I can't know the text the "With" is replacing (Npclist[NpcIndex]).
Thanks in advance

I personally wouldn't trust any single-regex solution to get it right on the first time nor feel like debugging it. Instead, I would parse the code line-to-line and cache any With expression to use it to replace any . directly preceded by whitespace or by any type of brackets (add use-cases as needed):
(?<=[\s[({])\. - positive lookbehind for any character from the set + escaped literal dot
(?:(?<=[\s[({])|^)\. - use this non-capturing alternatives list if to-be-replaced . can occur on the beginning of line
import re
def convert_vb_to_c(vb_code_lines):
c_code = []
current_with = ""
for line in vb_code_lines:
if re.search(r'^\s*With', line) is not None:
current_with = line[5:] + "."
continue
elif re.search(r'^\s*End With', line) is not None:
current_with = "{error_outside_with_replacement}"
continue
line = re.sub(r'(?<=[\s[({])\.', current_with, line)
c_code.append(line)
return "\n".join(c_code)
example = """
With Npclist[NpcIndex]
.goTo(245)
End With
With hatla
.matla.tatla[.matla.other] = .matla.other2
dont.mind.me(.do.mind.me)
.next()
End With
"""
# use file_object.readlines() in real life
print(convert_vb_to_c(example.split("\n")))

You can pass a function to the sub method:
# just to give the idea of the regex
regex = re.compile(r'''With (.+)
(the-regex-for-the-VB-expression)+?
End With''')
def repl(match):
beginning = match.group(1) # NpcList[NpcIndex] in your example
return ''.join(beginning + line for line in match.group(2).splitlines())
re.sub(regex, repl, the_string)
In repl you can obtain all the information about the matching from the match object, build whichever string you want and return it. The matched string will be replaced by the string you return.
Note that you must be really careful to write the regex above. In particular using (.+) as I did matches all the line up to the newline excluded, which or may not be what you want(but I don't know VB and I have no idea which regex could go there instead to catch only what you want.
The same goes for the (the-regex-forthe-VB-expression)+. I have no idea what code could be in those lines, hence I leave to you the detail of implementing it. Maybe taking all the line can be okay, but I wouldn't trust something this simple(probably expressions can span multiple lines, right?).
Also doing all in one big regular expression is, in general, error prone and slow.
I'd strongly consider regexes only to find With and End With and use something else to do the replacements.

This may do what you need in Python 2.7. I'm assuming you want to strip out the With and End With, right? You don't need those in C.
>>> import re
>>> search_text = """
... With Np1clist[Npc1Index]
... .comeFrom(543)
... End With
...
... With Npc2list[Npc2Index]
... .goTo(245)
... End With"""
>>>
>>> def f(m):
... return '{0}{1}({2})'.format(m.group(1), m.group(2), m.group(3))
...
>>> regex = r'With\s+([^\s]*)\s*(\.[^(]+)\(([^)]+)\)[^\n]*\nEnd With'
>>> print re.sub(regex, f, search_text)
Np1clist[Npc1Index].comeFrom(543)
Npc2list[Npc2Index].goTo(245)

Regex - match returns None. Where am I wrong?

>>> import re
>>> s = 'this is a test'
>>> reg1 = re.compile('test$')
>>> match1 = reg1.match(s)
>>> print match1
None
in Kiki that matches the test at the end of the s. What do I miss? (I tried re.compile(r'test$') as well)

Use
match1 = reg1.search(s)
instead. The match function only matches at the start of the string ... see the documentation here:
Python offers two different primitive operations based on regular expressions: re.match() checks for a match only at the beginning of the string, while re.search() checks for a match anywhere in the string (this is what Perl does by default).

Your regex does not match the full string. You can use search instead as Useless mentioned, or you can change your regex to match the full string:
'^this is a test$'
Or somewhat harder to read but somewhat less useless:
'^t[^t]*test$'
It depends on what you're trying to do.

It's because of that match method returns None if it couldn't find expected pattern, if it find the pattern it would return an object with type of _sre.SRE_match .
So, if you want Boolean (True or False) result from match you must check the result is None or not!
You could examine texts are matched or not somehow like this:
string_to_evaluate = "Your text that needs to be examined"
expected_pattern = "pattern"
if re.match(expected_pattern, string_to_evaluate) is not None:
print("The text is as you expected!")
else:
print("The text is not as you expected!")

python regex in pyparsing

How do you make the below regex be used in pyparsing? It should return a list of tokens given the regex.
Any help would be greatly appreciated! Thank you!
python regex example in the shell:
>>> re.split("(\w+)(lab)(\d+)", "abclab1", 3)
>>> ['', 'abc', 'lab', '1', '']
I tried this in pyparsing, but I can't seem to figure out how to get it right because the first match is being greedy, i.e the first token will be 'abclab' instead of two tokens 'abc' and 'lab'.
pyparsing example (high level, i.e non working code):
name = 'abclab1'
location = Word(alphas).setResultsName('location')
lab = CaselessLiteral('lab').setResultsName('environment')
identifier = Word(nums).setResultsName('identifier')
expr = location + lab + identifier
match, start, end = expr.scanString(name).next()
print match.asDict()

Pyparsing's classes are pretty much left-to-right, with lookahead implemented using explicit expressions like FollowedBy (for positive lookahead) and NotAny or the '~' operator (for negative lookahead). This allows you to detect a terminator which would normally match an item that is being repeated. For instance, OneOrMore(Word(alphas)) + Literal('end') will never find a match in strings like "start blah blah end", because the terminating 'end' will get swallowed up in the repetition expression in OneOrMore. The fix is to add negative lookahead in the expression being repeated: OneOrMore(~Literal('end') + Word(alphas)) + Literal('end') - that is, before reading another word composed of alphas, first make sure it is not the word 'end'.
This breaks down when the repetition is within a pyparsing class, like Word. Word(alphas) will continue to read alpha characters as long as there is no whitespace to stop the word. You would have to break into this repetition using something very expensive, like Combine(OneOrMore(~Literal('lab') + Word(alphas, exact=1))) - I say expensive because composition of simple tokens using complex Combine expressions will make for a slow parser.
You might be able to compromise by using a regex wrapped in a pyparsing Regex object:
>>> labword = Regex(r'(\w+)(lab)(\d+)')
>>> print labword.parseString("abclab1").dump()
['abclab1']
This does the right kind of grouping and detection, but does not expose the groups themselves. To do that, add names to each group - pyparsing will treat these like results names, and give you access to the individual fields, just as if you had called setResultsName:
>>> labword = Regex(r'(?P<locn>\w+)(?P<env>lab)(?P<identifier>\d+)')
>>> print labword.parseString("abclab1").dump()
['abclab1']
- env: lab
- identifier: 1
- locn: abc
>>> print labword.parseString("abclab1").asDict()
{'identifier': '1', 'locn': 'abc', 'env': 'lab'}
The only other non-regex approach I can think of would be to define an expression to read the whole string, and then break up the parts in a parse action.

If you strip the subgroup sign(the parenthesis), you'll get the right answer:)
>>> re.split("\w+lab\d+", "abclab1")
['', '']