Chapter 4: Strings

Contents
• String type
• Indexing strings []
• Slicing strings [2:4]
• Looping through strings with for and while
• Concatenating strings with +
• in as an operator
• String comparison
• String library (Searching and Replacing text, Stripping white
space )

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String Data Type
• A string is a sequence of >>> str1 = "Hello“
characters >>> str2 = 'there‘
>>> bob = str1 + str2
• A string literal uses quotes >>> print(bob)
‘Hello’ or “Hello” Hellothere
>>> str3 = '123‘
• For strings, + means >>> str3 = str3 + 1
“concatenate” Traceback (most recent call
last): File "<stdin>", li
• When a string contains ne 1, in <module>TypeError:
numbers, it is still a string cannot concatenate 'str' a
nd 'int' objects
• We can convert numbers in >>> x = int(str3) + 1
a string into a number using >>> print(x)
int() 124

3
Handling User Input
• We prefer to read >>> name = raw_input('Enter:')
Enter:Chuck
data in using strings >>> print(name)
and then parse and Chuck
convert the data as we >>> apple = raw_input('Enter:')
need Enter:100
>>> x = apple – 10
• This gives us more Traceback (most recent call las
control over error t): File "<stdin>", line 1, in
situations and/or bad <module>TypeError: unsupported
user input operand type(s) for -
: 'str' and 'int‘
• Raw input numbers >>> x = int(apple) – 10
must be converted >>> print(x)
from strings 90

4
Looking Inside Strings
• We can get at any single b a n a n a
character in a string using 0 1 2 3 4 5
an index specified in square
brackets
>>> fruit = 'banana‘
• The index value must be an
>>> letter = fruit[1]
integer and starts at zero
>>> print(letter)
• The index value can be an a
expression that is computed >>> n = 3
>>> w = fruit[n - 1]
>>> print(w)
n

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A Character Too Far
• You will get a python error if you attempt to index beyond
the end of a string.
• So be careful when constructing index values and slices

>>> zot = 'abc‘

>>> print(zot[5])
Traceback (most recent call last): File "<stdin>", line
1, in <module>IndexError: string index out of range
>>>

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Strings Have Length
• There is a built-in function len that gives us the length of a
string

b a n a n a
0 1 2 3 4 5

>>> fruit = 'banana'

>>> print(len(fruit) )
6

7
len Function
• A function is some stored code that we use. A function takes
some input and produces an output.
>>> fruit = 'banana‘
>>> x = len(fruit)
>>> print(x)
6

'banana' len() 6
(a string) function (a number)

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Looping Through Strings
• Using a while statement and an iteration variable, and the
len function, we can construct a loop to look at each of the
letters in a string individually

fruit = 'banana' 0b
index = 0 1a
while index < len(fruit): 2n
letter = fruit[index] 3a
print(index, letter) 4n
index = index + 1 5a

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Looping Through Strings using a “for”
statement
• A definite loop using a for statement is much more elegant
• The iteration variable is completely taken care of by the for
loop

fruit = 'banana' b
for letter in fruit: a
n
print(letter)
a
n
a

10
Looping and Counting
• This is a simple loop that loops through each letter
in a string and counts the number of times the loop
encounters the 'a' character.

word = 'banana'
count = 0
for letter in word:
if letter == 'a':
count = count + 1
print(count)

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Looking deeper into in
• The iteration variable “iterates” though the sequence
(ordered set)
• The block (body) of code is executed once for each value in
the sequence
• The iteration variable moves through all of the values in the
sequence

Six-character string
Iteration variable

for letter in 'banana':

print(letter)

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Looking deeper into in
• The iteration variable “iterates” though the string and the
block (body) of code is executed once for each value in the
sequence

b a n a n a

letter

for letter in 'banana':

print(letter)

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Slicing Strings
• We can also look at
any continuous M o n t y P y t h o n
section of a string 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11
using a colon
operator
>>> s = 'Monty Python'
• The second number
is one beyond the >>> print(s[0:4])
end of the slice - Mont
“up to but not >>> print ( s[6:7])
including”
P
• If the second >>> print(s[6:20])
number is beyond
the end of the Python
string, it stops at
the end

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Slicing Strings
• If we leave off
the first M o n t y P y t h o n
number or the 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11
last number of
the slice, it is >>> s = 'Monty Python'
assumed to be >>> print(s[:2])
the beginning Mo
or end of the >>> print(s[8:])
string thon
respectively >>> print(s[:])
Monty Python

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String Concatenation
• When the + operator is applied to strings, it means
"concatenation"

>>> a = 'Hello'
>>> b = a + 'There'
>>> print(b)
HelloThere

>>> c = a + ' ' + 'There'

>>> print(c)
Hello There

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The String Formatting Operator: %
• Used for math when the operand on the left is a number
the % is the modulus operator
• However when the operand to the left of the % operator is a
string then % is the string format operator.

>>> 32 % 5
2

>>> b = “Gold”
>>> print(“%s is a metal” % b)
Gold is a metal

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The String Format Operator: Dissected

format string

s = “%s is a metal” % b
string formatting code String formatting operator

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• The string format operator with more than one value being
inserted into the format string

b = “platinum”
a = 5
s = “%s is one of %d shiny metals” % (b, a)
print(s)
platinum is one of 5 shiny metals

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 String Formatting Codes
%s String
%c Character
%d Decimal (int)
%i Integer
%f Float
* Note: there are others, these are the most common ones.

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String Formatting Codes Advanced Usage

field width = 6

%-6.2f type of formatting = float

string format code symbol number of decimal places = 2

left justify

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Using in as an Operator
• The in keyword can >>> fruit = 'banana'
also be used to >>> 'n' in fruit
check to see if one True
string is "in" another >>> 'm' in fruit
string False
>>> 'nan' in fruit
• The in expression is True
a logical expression >>> if 'a' in fruit :
and returns True or print('Found it!')
False and can be Found it!
used in an if
statement

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String Comparison
word = 'blueberry'

if word == 'banana':
print('All right, bananas.')

if word < 'banana':

print('Your word,' + word + ', comes before banana.')
elif word > 'banana':
print('Your word,' + word + ', comes after banana.')
else:
print('All right, bananas.')

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String Library
• Python has a number of >>> greet = 'Hello Bob'
string functions which are >>> zap = greet.lower()
in the string library >>> print(zap)
• These functions are hello bob
already built into every >>> print(greet)
string - we invoke them Hello Bob
by appending the >>> print('Hi There'.lo
function to the string
variable wer())
hi there
• These functions do not >>>
modify the original string,
instead they return a new
string that has been
altered

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The Directory Function – dir()
>>> stuff = 'Hello world'
>>> type(stuff)
<type 'str'>
>>>> dir(stuff)
['capitalize', 'center', 'count', 'decode', 'enco
de', 'endswith’,'expandtabs', 'find’,'format’,
'index','isalnum','isalpha','isdigit’, 'islower',
'isspace', 'istitle', 'isupper', 'join’,
'ljust','lower', 'lstrip', 'partition','replace',
'rfind', 'rindex', 'rjust', 'rpartition’,
'rsplit', 'rstrip', 'split', 'splitlines', 'start
swith', 'strip', 'swapcase', 'title’,'translate',
'upper', 'zfill']

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String Library
str.capitalize()
str.center(width[, fillchar])
str.endswith(suffix[, start[, end]])
str.find(sub[, start[, end]])
str.lstrip([chars])
str.join(x [, sep])
str.replace(old, new[, count])
str.lower()
str.rstrip([chars])
str.strip([chars])
str.upper()

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Searching a String
• We use the find()
function to search for a b a n a n a
substring within 0 1 2 3 4 5
another string
• find() finds the first >>> fruit = 'banana'
occurance of the >>> pos = fruit.find('na')
substring >>> print(pos)
2
• If the substring is not
found, find() returns -1 >>> aa = fruit.find('z')
• Remember that string >>> print(aa)
position starts at zero -1

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Making everything UPPER CASE
• You can make a copy of a string in lower case or upper case
• Often when we are searching for a string using find(), we
first convert the string to lower case so we can search a
string regardless of case

>>> greet = 'Hello Bob'

>>> nnn = greet.upper()
>>> print(nnn)
HELLO BOB

>>> www = greet.lower()

>>> print(www)
hello bob
>>>
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Search and Replace
• The replace() function is like a “search and replace”
operation in a word processor
• It replaces all occurrences of the search string with the
replacement string
>>> greet = 'Hello Bob'
>>> nstr = greet.replace('Bob','
Jane')
>>> print(nstr)
Hello Jane

>>> greet = 'Hello Bob'

>>> nstr = greet.replace('o','X'
)
>>> print(nstr)
HellX BXb
>>>

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Stripping Whitespace
• Sometimes we want to >>> greet = ' Hello Bob '
>>> greet.lstrip()
take a string and 'Hello Bob '
remove whitespace at
the beginning and/or >>> greet.rstrip()
end ' Hello Bob'

• lstrip() and rstrip() to >>> greet.strip()

the left and right only 'Hello Bob'
>>>
• strip() Removes both
beginning and ending
whitespace

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Prefixes
>>> line = 'Please have a nice day'
>>> line.startswith('Please')
True

>>> line.startswith('p')
False

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 21 31

From [email protected] Sat Jan 5 09:14:16 2008

>>> data = 'From [email protected] Sat Jan 5 09:14:16 2008'

>>> atpos = data.find('@')
>>> print(atpos)
21
>>> sppos = data.find(' ',atpos)
>>> print(sppos)
31
>>> host = data[atpos + 1: sppos]
>>> print(host)
uct.ac.za

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References
1. MIT Introduction to Computer Science and Programming
in Python
2. Think Python: How to Think Like a Computer Scientist:
https://greenteapress.com/thinkpython2/html/index.html

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Thank you for
your attention!

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