Match object
A match object is a regular-expression result structure containing matched text and providing access to its location and captured groups.
The Quick Python Book, Fourth Edition
A match object is a Python regular-expression result object that records the substring matched and provides access to captured groups and match positions.
- How it is used
- Uses match objects to extract named fields from records and compute replacements for matched substrings.
- How deep it goes
- Explains search results, named-group access, optional groups, and substitution callbacks, but leaves position-related methods undetailed.
- Examples
- Demonstrates extracting names and phone numbers from records and changing matched integers to strings ending in `.0`.
- What you can do after
- Apply it via Python `re` to inspect named matches and generate replacements from each match.
Read how The Quick Python Book, Fourth Edition explains match object →
Python How-To
A match object represents one regular-expression match and provides information about that match, such as its location.
- How it is used
- Uses successful regular-expression searches to inspect matched text, positions, and captured fields.
- How deep it goes
- Explains creation, truthiness, core inspection methods, numbered groups, and iteration, without descending into implementation internals.
- Examples
- Demonstrates matched text and spans, numbered groups, and parsing structured task records.
- What you can do after
- Diagnose regular-expression results by testing truthiness and printing matched text, captured groups, and character positions.
Related concepts
- groupuses · group() is a regular-expression match-object method that returns the complete match or the text captured by a specified capturing group.
- re.searchproduced by · re.search is a Python re-module function that searches a string for the first match of a regular-expression pattern and returns a match object or None.
- subproduced by · re.sub is a Python re-module function that returns a string with non-overlapping matches of a regular-expression pattern replaced by specified text or a callable result.
- conditional logicuses · Conditional logic is a programming technique that selects execution paths, actions, or result values according to evaluated conditions.
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