Python - match a word in a string with a list of strings

Question

I\'m new to python and I was wondering how string comparison is done

Let\'s say I have a list of strings containing state names like

states = [\"New York         


        

Answer 1

states = ["New York", "California", "Nebraska", "Idaho"]
postal_addr = "1234 1st E St San Jose California 95112"

result = None
for state in states:
    if state in postal_addr:
        result = state

print(result)

Unfortunately, this will also match words that contain a state name such as Idahoba.

Answer 2

To find all matches in the string you could do:

matches = [m for m in postal_addr.split() if m in states]

Answer 3

I would do

matches = [ s for s in states if s in postal_addr ]

Then, if you want to get the string from the postal address:

import re
if matches:
    extracted = re.findall( matches[0],  postal_addr)[0]

EDIT: ..but this won't work for city/state combos where the city name contains a different state, for example if postal_adr = '1 Arrowhead Dr, Kansas City, Missouri 64129' and states = ["New York", "California", "Nebraska", "Idaho", "Missouri", "Kansas"] etc. In this case

import re
if matches:
    extracted = [(re.search(m, postal_addr).start() , m) for m in matches ]
    extracted = sorted( extracted )[-1][1]

Answer 4

Here's another alternative answer using a regexp:

import re

states = ["New York", "California", "Nebraska", "Idaho"]
pattern = re.compile(r'.*(' + r'|'.join(states) + ').*')

postal_addr = "1234 1st E St San Jose California 95112"
match = pattern.match(postal_addr)

if match:
    state = match.group(1)

Answer 5

You can try like this,

In [2]: states = ["New York", "California", "Nebraska", "Idaho"]

In [3]: postal_addr = "1234 1st E St San Jose California 95112"

In [4]: ''.join(state for state in states if state in postal_addr)
Out[4]: 'California'

Answer 6

>>> states = ["New York", "California", "Nebraska", "Idaho"]
>>> postal_addr = "1234 1st E St San Jose California 95112"
>>> first_match = next(state for state in states if state in postal_addr)
>>> first_match
'California'

However, if you need to match at word boundaries, you might be better off using a regex.