PYTHON PROGRAMMING

UNIT 3 PART-A : STRINGS

STRINGS : Accessing Characters and Substrings in a String, String Methods, Basic String
operations, String Slicing, Testing, Searching, Comparing and manipulating Strings.

STRINGS:

Defination of a String : Astring is a sequence of characters . String is an immutable sequence

data type .Python stringis a sequence of Unicode characters that is enclosed in the quotations
marks.

A string can be either created by using single quotes (' ') or double quotes(" "). Python treats
single quotes the same as double quotes.

Creating string using single quotes and double qoutes

A string can be created using either single quotes or double quotes .However,if your string
contains double quotes use single quotes. And if your string contains single quotes use double
quotes.

SYNTAX :strname='text' or strname="text"

example :

1)

str='Hii everyone!Welcome to python'#strname='text'

print(str) # string using single quotes

Output:

Hii everyone!Welcome to python

2)

str="Hii everyone!Welcome to python" # strname="text"

print(str) # string using double quotes

Output:

Hii everyone!Welcome to python

3)# if your string contains double quotes use single quotes

str='Hii everyone!"Welcome to python" ' # if your string contains double quotes use single
quotes

print(str) # string using single quotes strname='text’

Output:

Hii everyone!"Welcome to python"

4)# if your string contains single quotes use double quotes

str="Hii everyone!'Welcome to python' " # if your string contains single quotes use double
quotes

print(str) # string using double quotes strname="text"

Output:

Hii everyone!'Welcome to python'

Multiline strings

In python,it is possible to have a string that spans multiple lines.

To create a multiline string,surround or enclose a string with triple single quotes(''' ''')or triple
double quotes(""" """).

Example :

1)#using single triple quotes

str='''hii

hello

world'''

print(str) # multilinestrings using single triple quotes str='''text'''

Output:

hii

hello

world

ACCESSING CHARACTERS AND SUBSTRINGS IN A STRING

In Python, individual characters of a String can be accessed by using the method of Indexing.
Indexing allows negative address references too to access characters from the back of the
String, e.g. -1 refers to the last character, -2 refers to the second last character and so on.  This
negative indexing is called as backward indexing. The positive indexing is called as forward
indexing,example 0 represents the first character , 1 represents the second character, 2
represents the third chaqrcter and so on.

Indexing

To access a single character, use indexing.

Indexing uses square brackets ([ ]) to access characters.

0 represents the first character , 1 represents the second character of a string and so on.

While accessing an index out of the range will cause an  IndexError. Only Integers are
allowed to be passed as an index, float or other types will cause a TypeError.

Example :

1) #forward indexing

str="hi everyone"

print(str[0]) # prints h

print(str[1]) # prints i

Output:

while -1 represents the last character,and -2 represents the second to the last character .

2) #backward indexing
str="hi everyone"

print(str[-1]) # prints e

print(str[-2]) # prints n

Output:

fig1.INDEXINGforward indexing (positive numbers) &

backward indexing(negative numbers).

STRING METHODS

Python has a set of built-in methods that you can use on strings.

To avail the string method or string function is stringname.stringfunction()

Ex:

str.capitalize() , str.lower() , str.upper() , str.title() , str.isdigit(),………etc.

Note: All string methods returns new values. They do not change the original string.

1) Capitalize String
The capitalize() function returns the string where the first letter is in uppercase.

Example

# capitalize method or capitalize() function

str='hi everyone !welcome to python'

x=str.capitalize()

print(str) # the string remains the same

print(x) # the first letter of the sting converts into capital

Output:

hi everyone !welcome to python

Hi everyone !welcome to python

2) Upper() function
Convert to upper case

The upper() function returns a copy of the given string but all the letters are in upper case.

Example

# upper() function

str='hi everyone !welcome to python'

x=str.upper()

print(str) # the string remains the same

print(x) # the sting converts into upper case

Output:

hi everyone !welcome to python

HI EVERYONE !WELCOME TO PYTHON

3) Lower() function
Convert to lower case

The lower() function returns a copy of the given string but all letters are in lower case.
Example
1)
# lower() function
str='HI EVERYONE!WELCOE TO PYTHON'
x=str.lower()
print(str) # the string remains the same
 print(x) # the sting converts into lower case

Output:

HI EVERYONE!WELCOE TO PYTHON
hieveryone!welcoe to python

2)
# lower() function
str='Hi Everyone!Welcome To Python'
x=str.lower()
print(str) # the string remains the same
print(x) # the sting converts into lower case

Output:

Hi Everyone!Welcome To Python
hieveryone!welcome to python

4) len() function
Get the length of the string.
The length of a string is the number of characters it contains.
The len() function returns the length of a string.
It takes one parameter,the string.
Example
1)
#length of the string
str='Hi Everyone!Welcome To Python'
print(len(str))

output:
29

2)
#length of the string
str='Hi Everyone!Welcome To Python'
x=len(str)
print("the length of the string is ",x)
 Output:
the length of the string is 29
5) replace() function
Replacing parts of the string

The replace() function replaces the occurrences of a specified substring with another substring.

Syntax:

string.replace(old,new)

 old- the substring to be replaced,it is case-sensitive.

 new-the new substring that will replace the old substring.

Note: Old substring is case-sensitive

1)

#replace() function

str="Hello World!"

x=str.replace("World","Everyone")

print(str) # before replacing

print(x) # after replacing

Output:

Hello World!
Hello Everyone!

2) Now , in this example world will not be replaced with Everyone because the first letter of the
world is not in upper case , to replace the old substring with new substring the first letter of
the old substring should be in uppercase i.e World.

Example

#replace() function
str="Hello World!"

x=str.replace("world","Everyone")

print(str) #before replacing

print(x) #the first letter of the old substring is not in upper case

#so the new substring is not replaced with old substring

Output:

Hello World!

Hello World!

3) The replace() function replaces all occurences of the old substring with the new substring.
Example

str="Hello World! I Love World! World is amazing!"

x=str.replace("World","Everyone")

print(x)

Output:

Hello Everyone! I Love Everyone! Everyone is amazing!

4)

But you can specify how many occurences you would like to be replaced, on the third argument.

In this example,onlytwo occurences of the substring World will be replaced with Everyone.

Example

#replace() function replaces all occurences of the old substring with the new substring

str="Hello World! I Love World! World is amazing!"

x=str.replace("World","Everyone",2)

print(str)

print(x)
Output:

Hello World! I Love World! World is amazing!

Hello Everyone! I Love Everyone! World is amazing!

6) Check if a value is present in a string

 To check if a substring is present in a string,use the in keyword.
It returns True if the substring is found .
Note that evaluation is case-senstive .

Example:
str="python is fun to learn"
x="learn" in str
print(x)

Output:
True

 Alternatively, you can use the not inkeyword ,it returns True if the substring is not
found .
Example :
str="python is fun to learn"
x="world" not in str #it returns true if the substring is not found in the string
print(x)

Output:
True

7)  find() Method
*The find() method finds the first occurrence of the specified value.

*The find() method returns -1 if the value is not found.

*The find() method is almost the same as the index() method, the only difference is that 2)

 the index() method raises an exception if the value is not found.

1)

# The find() method finds the first occurrence of the specified value

# find() method or find() function

str="Hello, welcome to my world."

x=str.find("Hello")

print(x)

Output:

# The find() method returns -1 if the value is not found.

# find() method or find() function

str="Hello, welcome to my world."

x=str.find("Hi")

print(x)

Output:

-1

8) count() method
The count() method returns the number of times a specified value appears in the string.

#count() method

str="python is interpreted ,python is interactive and python is object-orirented "

x=str.count("python")

print(x)
Output:

9) index() Method
#index() method

1)

str="Hello, welcome to my world."

x=str.index("welcome")

print(x)

Output:

2)

txt="Hello, welcome to my world."

x =txt.index("e")

print(x)

Output:

10)isalpha() Method

The isalpha() method returns True if all the characters are alphabet letters (a-z).

Example of characters that are not alphabet letters: (space)!#%&? etc.

1)

#isaplpha() method

str="hiiipython"
x=str.isalpha()

print(x)

Output:

True

2)

#isaplpha() method

str="hiii python"

x=str.isalpha()

print(x)

Output:

False

3)

#isaplpha() method

str="hiii python3@2020"

x=str.isalpha()

print(x)

Output:

False

11)
isdigit() Method

The isdigit() method returns True if all the characters are digits, otherwise False.

Exponents, like ², are also considered to be a digit.

Example:
#isdigit() method
str="59111321"
x=str.isdigit()
print(x) # True

Output:

True

12) title() Method

The title() method returns a string where the first character in every word is upper case. Like
a header, or a title.

If the word contains a number or a symbol, the first letter after that will be converted to upper
case.

#title() method

str="hii world! welcome to python!enjoy the world of python!"

x=str.title()

print(str) #original string

print(x) #string after title() method

Output:

hii world! welcome to python!enjoy the world of python!

Hii World! Welcome To Python!Enjoy The World Of Python!

13)swapcase() Method
The swapcase() method returns a string where all the upper case letters are lower case and vice
versa.

Example:
1)
#swapcase() method
str="Hiii Python"
x=str.swapcase()
print(x)
Output:
hIIIpYTHON
2)
#swapcase() method
str="Hello World"
x=str.swapcase()
print(x)
Output:
hELLOwORLD

These are some string methods in detail.There are many string methods or string functions and
they are as follows
Note: All string methods returns new values. They do not change the original string.

Method Description

capitalize() Converts the first character to upper case

casefold() Converts string into lower case

center() Returns a centered string

count() Returns the number of times a specified value occurs in a string

encode() Returns an encoded version of the string

endswith() Returns true if the string ends with the specified value

expandtabs() Sets the tab size of the string

find() Searches the string for a specified value and returns the position of where it was found

format() Formats specified values in a string

format_map() Formats specified values in a string

index() Searches the string for a specified value and returns the position of where it was found

isalnum() Returns True if all characters in the string are alphanumeric

isalpha() Returns True if all characters in the string are in the alphabet
isascii() Returns True if all characters in the string are ascii characters

isdecimal() Returns True if all characters in the string are decimals

isdigit() Returns True if all characters in the string are digits

isidentifier() Returns True if the string is an identifier

islower() Returns True if all characters in the string are lower case

isnumeric() Returns True if all characters in the string are numeric

isprintable() Returns True if all characters in the string are printable

isspace() Returns True if all characters in the string are whitespaces

istitle() Returns True if the string follows the rules of a title

isupper() Returns True if all characters in the string are upper case

join() Joins the elements of an iterable to the end of the string

ljust() Returns a left justified version of the string

lower() Converts a string into lower case

lstrip() Returns a left trim version of the string

maketrans() Returns a translation table to be used in translations

partition() Returns a tuple where the string is parted into three parts

replace() Returns a string where a specified value is replaced with a specified value

rfind() Searches the string for a specified value and returns the last position of where it was found

rindex() Searches the string for a specified value and returns the last position of where it was found

rjust() Returns a right justified version of the string

rpartition() Returns a tuple where the string is parted into three parts

rsplit() Splits the string at the specified separator, and returns a list
 rstrip() Returns a right trim version of the string

split() Splits the string at the specified separator, and returns a list

splitlines() Splits the string at line breaks and returns a list

startswith() Returns true if the string starts with the specified value

strip() Returns a trimmed version of the string

swapcase() Swaps cases, lower case becomes upper case and vice versa

title() Converts the first character of each word to upper case

translate() Returns a translated string

upper() Converts a string into upper case

zfill() Fills the string with a specified number of 0 values at the beginning

BASIC STRING OPERATIONS

In python, String operators represent the different types of operations that can be employed on
the program’s string type of variables. Python allows several string operators that can be applied
on the python string are as below:

 Assignment operator(=)
 Concatenate operator(+)
 String repetition operator(*)
 String slicing operator([])
 String comparison operator(“==” & “!=”)
 Membership operator(“in”& “not in”)
 Escape sequence operator( \)
 String formatting operator(“%” & “{}”)

1)Assignment operator(=)

Python string can be assigned to any variable with an assignment operator “= “. Python string
can be defined with either single quotes [‘ ’], double quotes[“ ”] or triple quotes[‘’’  ‘’’].
var_name = “string” assigns “string” to variable var_name.
syntax:

varaiblename="string"

Example:

# assignment operator "="

str="hii everyone !welcome to the world of python!"
print(str)

Output:

hii everyone !welcome to the world of python!

2) Concatenate operator: “+.”

Two strings can be concatenated or join using the “+” operator in python.
Concatenating strings simply means combining or adding strings together. We can combine as
many as strings we want.

To combine strings , use plus sign( + ).

Example:

#concatenating the strings

str1="hii everyone!"

str2="welcome to the world of python programming"

str=str1+str2 #concatenating the two strings str1 & str2

print(str)

Output:

hiieveryone!welcome to the world of python programming

3) String repetition operator: “*.”

The same string can be repeated in python by n times using string*n.

Example:
#String repetition operator (*)

str="Python is amazing!"

print(str*5)

Output:

Python is amazing!Python is amazing!Python is amazing!Python is amazing!Python is

amazing!

4) String slicing operator“[]”

Characters from a specific index of the string can be accessed with the string[index] operator.
The index is interpreted as a positive index starting from 0 from the left side and a negative index
starting from -1 from the right side.
To access a range of characters,usesilicing. Slicing uses square brackets( [] ). These square
brackets are called as silicing operators ( [ ] ).
The square brackets can contain two integers separated by a colon( : ). The first integer is the
start index, the second integer is the end index (exclusive).

Example SYNTAX : str[startindex:stopindex]

It prints the startindex value to the stopindex value excluding the stopindex element.

#slicing str[startindex:endindex]

str="Hi Everyone"

print(str[0:5]) # prints Hi Ev

Output:

Hi Everyon

(***REFER STRING SLICING TOPIC***)

5)String comparison operator(“==” & “!=”)

The string comparison operator in python is used to compare two strings.

 “==” operator returns Boolean True if two strings are the same and return Boolean False
if two strings are not the same.
 “!=” operator returns Boolean True if two strings are not the same and return Boolean
False if two strings are the same.

These operators are mainly used along with if condition to compare two strings where the

decision is to be taken based on string comparison.

Example:

1)#string comparision operator

str1=5
str2=5
print(str1==str2)
Output:
True

2)#string comparision operator

str1="Apples"
str2="Bananas"
print(str1==str2)
Output:
False

3)#string comparision operator

str1=5
str2=4
print(str1!=str2)
Output:
True

4)#string comparision operator

str1=5
str2=5
print(str1!=str2)
Output:
False

6) Membership operator(“in” & “not in”)

Membership operators are used to check if a sequence is present in an object like strings,list,etc.
There are 2 membership operators:
Operator Name
In The in Operator
not in The not in Operator
The in Operator
The in operator returns True if a sequence or value is present in an object.
Example:

1) This example prints True because the sequence "python" is present in the str variable.

str="welcome to the world of python programming"

x="python" in str

print(x)

Output:

True

2) This example prints False because the sequence "hii" is not present in the str variable.

str="welcome to the world of python programming"

x="hii" in str

print(x)

Output:
False

The not in operator

The not in operator returns True if a sequence or value is NOT present in an object.
The not in operator returns False if a sequence or value is present in an object.

Example:

1. This example prints True because the sequence “vegetables” is NOT present in the string

variable .

#the not in operator

str="I love fruits"

x="vegetables" not in str

print(x)

Output:

True

2)

This example prints False because the sequence “fruits” is NOT present in the string variable .

#the not in operator

str="I love fruits"

x="fruits" not in str

print(x)

Output:

False

7) Escape sequence operator( \)

To insert a non-allowed character in the given input string, an escape character is used. An
escape character is a “\” or “backslash” operator followed by a non-allowed character. An
example of a non-allowed character in python string is inserting double quotes in the string
surrounded by double-quotes.
Escaping characters is important in handling strings.
It helps us to make sure that our strings are recognized as a pieces of text, and not as part of
code.
Example:
1)#this will produce a syntax error
str='let's learn Python'

print(str)

Output:
Invalid Syntax error

2)#this will NOT produce a syntax error

str='let\'s learn Python'

print(str)

Output:
let's learn Python

8) String formatting operator(“%” & “{}”)

Method-1

String formatting operator is used to format a string as per requirement. To insert another type of
variable along with string, the “%” operator is used along with python string. “%” is prefixed to
another character indicating the type of value we want to insert along with the python string.
Please refer to the below table for some of the commonly used different string formatting
specifiers:

Operator Description

%d Signed decimal integer

%u Unsigned decimal integer

%c Character

%s String

%f Floating-point real number

Example:

#String formatting operator("%" & "{}")

name="Python"

year=1991

str1="Hello World! welcome to %s "%(name)

str2="%s is developed by Gudio van Rossum in the year %d"%(name,year)

str3="%s is interpreted,interactive and object-oriented programming language"%(name)

print(str1)
print(str2)

print(str3)

Output:

Hello World! welcome to Python

Python is developed by Gudio van Rossum in the year 1991

Python is interpreted,interactive and object-oriented programming language

Method-2

In Python, we can format a string by adding substring(s) within it.

The format( ) function allows us to format strings.

Placeholders { }

Placeholders help us control which part of the string should be formatted.

They are defined using curly braces { } .

In this example, we will concatenate (add) a substring to where the curly braces are placed.

#Python Formatting strings

x="I love {} very much!"

str=x.format("Python")

print(x) # original string

print(str) # formatted string

Output:

I love {} very much!

I love Python very much!

STRING SLICING
To access a range of characters,usesilicing. Slicing uses square brackets( [] ).
The square brackets can contain two integers separated by a colon( : ). The first integer is the

start index, the second integer is the end index (exclusive).

a. str(startindex:stopindex)

It prints the startindex value to the stopindexvalue excluding the stopindex element.

b. str(startindex:)

If we donot mention the stopindex value then it prints the value form startindex to the end

of the string(including the last element ).

c. str(:stopindex)

If we donot mention the start index value then it prints the value form startindex of the

string to the end of the stopindex(excluding the stopindexelement ).

d. str(:)

If we donot mention the start index and stop index then it prints the string as the same as

the original string.

Example

1)str(startindex:stopindex)

It prints the startindex value to the stopindex value excluding the stopindex element.

#slicingstr[startindex:endindex]

str="Hi Everyone"

print(str[0:5]) # prints Hi Ev

Output:

Hi Ev
2)str(startindex:)

If we donot mention the stopindex value then it prints the value form startindex to the end
of the string(including the last element ).

#slicing str[startindex:]

str="Hi Everyone"

print(str[3:]) # prints Everyone

Output:

Everyone

3) str(:stopindex)
If we donot mention the start index value then it prints the value form startindex of the
string to the end of the stopindex (excluding the stopindexelement ).

#slicing str[:stopindex]

str="Hi Everyone"

print(str[:10]) # prints Hi Everyon

Output:

Hi Everyon

4)str(:)

If we donot mention the start index and stop index then it prints the string as the same as
the original string.

#slicing str[:]
str="Hi Everyone"

print(str[:]) # prints Hi Everyone

Output:

Hi Everyone

String Comparison in Python

Method1: sing relational operators

The relational operators compare the Unicode values of the characters of the strings from the

zeroth index till the end of the string. It then returns a boolean value according to the operator

used.

Example:

print("AIML" == "AIML")

print("Aiml" < "aiml")

print("Aiml" > "aiml")

print("Aiml" != "Aiml")

Output:

True
True
False
False
Method 2: Using is and is not
The == operator compares the values of both the operands and checks for value equality.
Whereas is operator checks whether both the operands refer to the same object or not. The
same is the case for != and is not.
Let us understand this with an example:

str1 = "CMR"
str2 = "CMR"
str3 = str1
  
print("ID of str1 =", hex(id(str1)))
print("ID of str2 =", hex(id(str2)))
print("ID of str3 =", hex(id(str3)))
print(str1 is str1)
print(str1 is str2)
print(str1 is str3)
  
str1 += "IT"

str4 = "CMRIT"
  
print("\nID of changed str1 =", hex(id(str1)))
print("ID of str4 =", hex(id(str4)))
print(str1 is str4)

Output:

ID of str1 = 0x7f6037051570
ID of str2 = 0x7f6037051570
ID of str3 = 0x7f6037051570
True
True
True

ID of changed str1 = 0x7f60356137d8

ID of str4 = 0x7f60356137a0
False

The object ID of the strings may vary on different machines. The object IDs of str1, str2 and
str3 were the same therefore they the result is True in all the cases. After the object id of str1
is changed, the result of str1 and str2 will be false. Even after creating str4 with the same
contents as in the new str1, the answer will be false as their object IDs are different.

Vice-versa will happen with is not.

TESTING STRINGS

String class in python has various inbuilt methods which allows to check for different types of
strings.

Method name  Method Description

isalnum() Returns True if string is alphanumeric

isalpha() Returns True if string contains only alphabets

isdigit() Returns True if string contains only digits

isidentifier() Return True is string is valid identifier

islower() Returns True if string is in lowercase

Method name  Method Description

isupper() Returns True if string is in uppercase

isspace() Returns True if string contains only whitespace

Example:

>>> s = "welcome to python"

>>> s.isalnum()
False
>>> "Welcome".isalpha()
True
>>> "2012".isdigit()
True
>>> "first Number".isidentifier()
False
>>> s.islower()
True
>>> "WELCOME".isupper()
True
>>> " \t".isspace()
True

Searching for Substrings

Method Name Methods Description

endswith(s1: str): Returns True if strings ends with substring s1

bool

startswith(s1: str): Returns True if strings starts with substring s1

bool

count(substring): int Returns number of occurrences of substring the string

Method Name Methods Description

find(s1): int Returns lowest index from where s1 starts in the string, if string not found
returns -1

rfind(s1): int Returns highest index from where s1 starts in the string, if string not found
returns -1

>>> s = "welcome to python"

>>> s.endswith("thon")
True
>>> s.startswith("good")
False
>>> s.find("come")
3
>>> s.find("become")
-1
>>> s.rfind("o")
15
>>> s.count("o")
3
>>>