python: check for lines that have X number of periods '.'

Question

How do you check for lines with N number of periods in them?

my_count = 6
indict = open("dictionary.txt").read().splitlines()
for line in indict:
# if line has my_count num of '.':
    print line

dictionary.txt looks like:
A.BAN.DON
A.BOUND
A.BI.DING

Appreciate any help!

See http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1155617/count-occurrence-of-a-character-in-a-python-string — aqua, Mar 05 '13 at 03:30
Are there sentences? Do you only count words with periods? What about standalone? What about at the end of sentences? — dawg, Mar 05 '13 at 04:25

score 3 · Answer 1 · answered Mar 05 '13 at 03:30

3

Use the count function.

my_count = 6
indict = open("dictionary.txt").read().splitlines()
for line in indict:
    # if line has my_count num of '.':
    if line.count('.') == my_count:
        print line

answered Mar 05 '13 at 03:30

Tyler Ferraro

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score 0 · Answer 2 · answered Mar 05 '13 at 03:34

EDIT: Or well — look at the way described by @Tyler Ferraro.

The question is how do you define a line in your language? A line must end with a period. So technically a line can only contain 0 or 1 periods depending on who you ask.

If it's contained in '' like: '.' or "" like ".", then it's a different case and you could use regex.

I am assuming your line is like: A.BAN.DON

for line in indict:
# if line has my_count num of '.':
    for character in line:
        if character is ".":
            dotCount += 1
    print "line: %s has %d periods" % (line, dotCount)

And you can arrange the rest of the stuff yourself (like declaring dotCount, etc...)

python: check for lines that have X number of periods '.'

2 Answers2