Python: re..find longest sequence

Question

I have a string that is randomly generated:

polymer_str = \"diol diNCO diamine diNCO diamine diNCO diamine diNCO diol diNCO diamine\"

I\'d

Answer 1

import re
pat = re.compile("[^|]+")
p = "diol diNCO diamine diNCO diamine diNCO diamine diNCO diol diNCO diamine".replace("diNCO diamine","|").replace(" ","")
print max(map(len,pat.split(p)))