Chapter 6 - Strings

Strings

String Methods

Learning Objectives - String

Methods

Define a string method

Describe the syntax of a method

Identify some commonly used string methods

Strip

What is a String Method?

Strings have special commands called methods (more on methods in a
later lesson). Methods have a special syntax. First, start with a string (often
a variable that represents a string). Add a period after the string. Finally,
add the name of the method with any parameters. Parameters are values
that the method will use.

String Method with Parameters

Translation: Remove the string "world" from the string my_string.

The Strip Method

The strip method removes characters from the beginning or end of a
string. strip returns a modified copy of the original string.

string1 = "Hello world"

string2 = "world"
print(string1.strip(string2))
challenge

What happens if you:

Change string2 to "Hello"?
Change string2 to "ld"?
Change string2 to "ell"?
Starts With

The Starts With Method

The startswith method returns either True or False if a string starts with
another string. For example, my_string.startswith("this") will return True
if my_string starts with "this". If not, it will return false. The startswith
method is a bit different because some of the parameters are optional. The
first parameter, a string, is mandatory. startswith will start the
comparison with the first character in the string. However, you can change
where the comparison starts and ends with the optional parameters.

Optional Parameters

my_string = "this is a string"

my_bool = my_string.startswith("this")
print(my_bool)

challenge

What happens if you:

Change my_bool to my_string.startswith("This")?
Change my_bool to my_string.startswith("is", 2)?
Change my_bool to my_string.startswith("is", 2, 3)?
Change my_bool to my_string.startswith("is", 2, 4)?
Replace

The Replace Method

The replace method returns a copy of the original string in which part of
the original string (also called a substring) has been replaced with another
set of characters.

my_string = "dog mouse fish dog bear"

new_string = my_string.replace("dog", "cat")
print(new_string)

challenge

What happens if you:

Change my_string to "dogmousefishdogbear"?
Change new_string to "my_string.replace("Dog", "cat")?
Change new_string to "my_string.replace("dog", "cat", 1)?
Find

The Find Method

The find method searches for a word or character in a string. If the word
or character is found, the index is returned. If not, -1 is returned. You can
tell find where to start the search and where to end the search. By default,
find will search the entire string.

Find Method

string1 = "The brown dog jumps over the lazy fox."

string2 = "brown"
print(string1.find(string2))

challenge

What happens if you:

Change string2 to "zebra"?
Change string2 back to "brown" and change the print statement to
print(string1.find(string2, 10))?
Change the print statement to print(string1.find(string2, 0, 3))?
Upper

The Upper Method

There are some string methods that do not require parameters. You still
must use the parentheses even if there are no parameters. The upper
method is an example of this. The upper method returns a copy of the
original string with all uppercase characters.

String Method with No Parameters

Translation: Convert all the characters of my_string to uppercase.

my_string = "the big brown dog"

print(my_string.upper())

challenge

What happens if you:

Change my_string to "ThE bIg BrOwN dOg"?
Change my_string to "THE BIG BROWN DOG"?
Change my_string to "123!@#"?
Lower

The Lower Method

The lower method creates a copy of a string, and returns the copy with all
lowercase characters. lower does not take any parameters.

my_string = "THE BIG BROWN DOG"

print(my_string.lower())

challenge

What happens if you:

Change my_string to "tHe BiG bRoWn DoG"?
Change my_string to "the big brown dog"?
Change my_string to "214%#%"?
Capitalize

The Capitalize Method

The capitalize method returns a copy of a string with only the first
character capitalized.

my_string = "the big brown dog"

print(my_string.capitalize())

challenge

What happens if you:

Change my_string to "tHe BiG bRoWn DoG"?
Change my_string to "THE BIG BROWN DOG"?
Change my_string to "123^&*"?
Title

The Title Method

The title method creates a copy of a string, and returns a string with the
first letter of each word capitalized. All other characters of the word will
be lowercase.

my_string = "the big brown dog"

print(my_string.title())

challenge

What happens if you:

Change my_string to "tHe BiG bRoWn DoG"?
Change my_string to "thebigbrowndog"?
Change my_string to "a1 1a a a a"?

Other String Methods

There are many more string methods. Here are a few examples:
 Method Example Description
center(width, Center a string in a given width, fill any
Center
fill) whitespace with a given character
count(str,
Count Count how many times a string appears
start, end)

endswith(str, Return True if a string ends with a

Ends With
start, end) specific string
index(str, Return index of str in a string, will raise
Index
start, end) an exception if not found
Is
isalnum() Returns True if string is alphanumeric
Alphanumeric
Is Alphabetic isalpha() Returns True if string is alphabetic
Is Digit isdigit() Returns True if string is just digits
Is Lower islower() Returns True if the string is lowercase
Returns True if the strings is nothing but
Is Space isspace()
spaces
Is Title istitle() Returns True if the string is title case
Is Upper isupper() Returns True if string is all uppercase