Python regular expression extract the text between two values

Question

what a regular expression to extract the text between two values?

in:

<office:annotation office:name="__Annotation__45582_97049284">
</office:annotation>
    case 1 there can be an arbitrary text with any symbols
<office:annotation-end office:name="__Annotation__45582_97049284"/>

<office:annotation office:name="__Annotation__19324994_2345354">
</office:annotation>
    case 2there can be an arbitrary text with any symbols
<office:annotation-end office:name="__Annotation__19324994_2345354"/>

out:

list = [
'case 1 there can be an arbitrary text with any symbols',
'case 2 there can be an arbitrary text with any symbols',
]

You'll be better off using an xml parser. – Paulo Bu Jul 05 '14 at 12:49 — Paulo Bu, Jul 05 '14 at 12:49

Avinash Raj · Accepted Answer · 2014-07-05T13:27:03.660

3

It's better to use an XML parser, if you want a regex solution then try the below,

>>> str = """<office:annotation office:name="__Annotation__45582_97049284">
... </office:annotation>
...     case 1 there can be an arbitrary text with any symbols
... <office:annotation-end office:name="__Annotation__45582_97049284"/>
... 
... <office:annotation office:name="__Annotation__19324994_2345354">
... </office:annotation>
...     case 2there can be an arbitrary text with any symbols
... <office:annotation-end office:name="__Annotation__19324994_2345354"/>"""
>>> m = re.findall(r'<\/office:annotation>\s*(.*)(?=\n<office:annotation-end)', str)
>>> m
['case 1 there can be an arbitrary text with any symbols', 'case 2there can be an arbitrary text with any symbols']

OR

A better regex would be,

<\/office:annotation>([\w\W\s]*?)(?=\n?<office:annotation-end)

edited Jul 05 '14 at 13:27

answered Jul 05 '14 at 12:58

Avinash Raj

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strange, it seems that I need, but your example returns an empty list – Andrew Nodermann Jul 05 '14 at 13:10
does not correct for the same line without formatting (spaces, the line breaks) http://regex101.com/r/rK2hC3/1 – Andrew Nodermann Jul 05 '14 at 13:19
Thank you very much it's work! (it is not I have set you a minus) – Andrew Nodermann Jul 05 '14 at 13:28
It may look like it works, but it doesn't. [It can't](http://stackoverflow.com/a/1732454/3001761). It will break at the slightest change to your input. – Lukas Graf Jul 05 '14 at 13:30

score 0 · Answer 2 · edited May 23 '17 at 12:11

Since this is a namespaced XML document, you'll have to deal with those namespaces when selecting nodes. See this answer for details.

Here's how you would parse it using lxml and xpath expressions:

data.xml

<?xml version='1.0' encoding='UTF-8'?>
<document xmlns:office="http://www.example.org/office">

    <office:annotation office:name="__Annotation__45582_97049284">
    </office:annotation>
        case 1 there can be an arbitrary text with any symbols
    <office:annotation-end office:name="__Annotation__45582_97049284"/>

    <office:annotation office:name="__Annotation__19324994_2345354">
    </office:annotation>
        case 2there can be an arbitrary text with any symbols
    <office:annotation-end office:name="__Annotation__19324994_2345354"/>

</document>

parse.py

from lxml import etree

tree = etree.parse('data.xml')
root = tree.getroot()
nsmap = root.nsmap

annotations = root.xpath('//office:annotation', namespaces=nsmap)

comments = []
for annotation in annotations:
    comment = annotation.tail.strip()
    comments.append(comment)

print comments

Output:

['case 1 there can be an arbitrary text with any symbols',
 'case 2there can be an arbitrary text with any symbols']

kevr · Answer 3 · 2014-07-05T13:29:27.927

0

>>> regex = re.compile(r'</.+>\s*(.+)\s*<.+>')
>>> matched = re.findall(regex, text)
>>> print(matched)
['case 1 there can be an arbitrary text with any symbols', 'case 2there can be an arbitrary text with any symbols']

Edit: There we go. Bah.. these edit points.

edited Jul 05 '14 at 13:29

answered Jul 05 '14 at 13:22

kevr

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Python regular expression extract the text between two values

3 Answers3