Python 2.7. Extracting data from some part of a string using a regex -

let's import regex.

import re 

assume there's string containing data.

data = '''mike: jan 25.1, feb 24.3, mar 29.0    rob: jan 22.3, feb 20.0, mar 22.0    nick: jan 23.4, feb 22.0, mar 23.4''' 

for example, want extract floats rob's line only.

name = 'rob' 

i'd make this:

def data_extractor(name, data):     return re.findall(r'\d+\.\d+', re.findall(r'{}.*'.format(name),data)[0]) 

the output ['22.3', '20.0', '22.0'].

is way pythonic or should improved somehow? job, i'm not appropriateness of such code.

thanks time.

a non-regex way consists in splitting lines , trimming them, , checking 1 starts rob , grab float values:

import re data = '''mike: jan 25.1, feb 24.3, mar 29.0    rob: jan 22.3, feb 20.0, mar 22.0    nick: jan 23.4, feb 22.0, mar 23.4''' name = 'rob' lines = [line.strip() line in data.split("\n")] l in lines:     if l.startswith(name):         print(re.findall(r'\d+\.\d+', l)) # => ['22.3', '20.0', '22.0'] 

see python demo

if want use purely regex way, may use pypi regex module \g based regex:

import regex data = '''mike: jan 25.1, feb 24.3, mar 29.0    rob: jan 22.3, feb 20.0, mar 22.0    nick: jan 23.4, feb 22.0, mar 23.4''' name = 'rob' rx = r'(?:\g(?!\a)|{}).*?(\d+\.\d+)'.format(regex.escape(name)) print(regex.findall(rx, data)) 

see online python demo

this pattern matches:

• (?:\g(?!\a)|{}) - end of last successful match or name contents
• .*? - 0+ chars other line break chars, few possible
• (\d+\.\d+) - group 1 (just value findall return) matching 1+ digits, . , 1+ digits.

the regex.escape(name) escape chars (, ) etc. might appear in name.