splitting a string in python having multiple splitters

Question

How to split a string variable like below into individual groups? var.split(",") splits those inside the brackets also.

var = "(5, 'kghjsg'), (6, 'kghjsghk'), (7, 'jksgjsg'), (8, 'ksgshgk'), (9, 'hjsdhg')"

desired result:

[(5, 'kghjsg'),  
(6, 'kghjsghk'), 
..
]

Is your string guaranteed to be in that format? If so, you can use literal_eval(). — thegrinner
– thegrinner, Commented Jan 14, 2014 at 21:20

Ashwini Chaudhary · Accepted Answer · 2014-01-14 21:20:03Z

4

Use ast.literal_eval:

>>> from ast import literal_eval
>>> var = "(5, 'kghjsg'), (6, 'kghjsghk'), (7, 'jksgjsg'), (8, 'ksgshgk'), (9, 'hjsdhg')"
>>> literal_eval(var)
((5, 'kghjsg'), (6, 'kghjsghk'), (7, 'jksgjsg'), (8, 'ksgshgk'), (9, 'hjsdhg'))

From docs:

Safely evaluate an expression node or a Unicode or Latin-1 encoded string containing a Python expression. The string or node provided may only consist of the following Python literal structures: strings, numbers, tuples, lists, dicts, booleans, and None.

answered Jan 14, 2014 at 21:20

Ashwini Chaudhary

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1 Comment

thegrinner Over a year ago

Note this assumes the string to be parsed is a valid Python expression.

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