4.2.4 Regular Expression Objects

Compiled regular expression objects support the following methods and attributes:

search (string[, pos][, endpos])

Scan through string looking for a location where this regular expression produces a match, and return a corresponding MatchObject instance. Return None if no position in the string matches the pattern; note that this is different from finding a zero-length match at some point in the string. The optional pos and endpos parameters have the same meaning as for the match() method.

match (string[, pos][, endpos])

If zero or more characters at the beginning of string match this regular expression, return a corresponding MatchObject instance. Return None if the string does not match the pattern; note that this is different from a zero-length match.

Note: If you want to locate a match anywhere in string, use search() instead.

The optional second parameter pos gives an index in the string where the search is to start; it defaults to 0. This is not completely equivalent to slicing the string; the '' pattern character matches at the real beginning of the string and at positions just after a newline, but not necessarily at the index where the search is to start.

The optional parameter endpos limits how far the string will be searched; it will be as if the string is endpos characters long, so only the characters from pos to endpos will be searched for a match.

split (string, [, maxsplit = 0])

Identical to the split() function, using the compiled pattern.

findall (string)

Identical to the findall() function, using the compiled pattern.

sub (repl, string[, count = 0])

Identical to the sub() function, using the compiled pattern.

subn (repl, string[, count = 0])

Identical to the subn() function, using the compiled pattern.

flags

The flags argument used when the regex object was compiled, or 0 if no flags were provided.

groupindex

A dictionary mapping any symbolic group names defined by (?P<id>) to group numbers. The dictionary is empty if no symbolic groups were used in the pattern.

pattern

The pattern string from which the regex object was compiled.