This function attempts to match RE pattern to string with optional flags.
Syntax
Here is the syntax for this function −
re.match(pattern, string, flags=0)
Here is the description of the parameters −
| Sr.No. | Parameter & Description |
|---|---|
| 1 | pattern This is the regular expression to be matched. |
| 2 | string This is the string, which would be searched to match the pattern at the beginning of string. |
| 3 | flags You can specify different flags using bitwise OR (|). These are modifiers, which are listed in the table below. |
The re.match function returns a match object on success, None on failure. We usegroup(num) or groups() function of match object to get matched expression.
| Sr.No. | Match Object Method & Description |
|---|---|
| 1 | group(num=0) This method returns entire match (or specific subgroup num) |
| 2 | groups() This method returns all matching subgroups in a tuple (empty if there weren't any) |
Example
#!/usr/bin/python import re line = "Cats are smarter than dogs" matchObj = re.match( r'(.*) are (.*?) .*', line, re.M|re.I) if matchObj: print "matchObj.group() : ", matchObj.group() print "matchObj.group(1) : ", matchObj.group(1) print "matchObj.group(2) : ", matchObj.group(2) else: print "No match!!"
Output
When the above code is executed, it produces the following result −
matchObj.group() : Cats are smarter than dogs matchObj.group(1) : Cats matchObj.group(2) : smarter