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How to split a string into words in Python

How to split a string into words in Python.

Here's a step-by-step tutorial on how to split a string into words in Python:

Step 1: Understand the Problem​

Before we begin, let's clarify what we mean by "splitting a string into words." In Python, a word is typically defined as a sequence of characters separated by whitespace. For example, in the string "Hello, how are you?", the words are "Hello,", "how", "are", and "you?".

Step 2: Choose a Method​

Python provides several methods for splitting strings. The most common methods are:

  • Using the split() method: This method splits a string into a list of words based on whitespace by default.
  • Using regular expressions: This method allows for more complex splitting patterns, such as splitting based on punctuation marks or specific characters.

For the purpose of this tutorial, we will focus on using the split() method.

Step 3: Using the split() Method​

To split a string into words using the split() method, follow these steps:

  1. Initialize a string variable with the desired text:
text = "Hello, how are you?"
  1. Use the split() method on the string variable:
words = text.split()
  1. Print the resulting words:
print(words)

The output will be:

['Hello,', 'how', 'are', 'you?']

Step 4: Handling Different Delimiters​

By default, the split() method splits the string based on whitespace. However, you can also specify a different delimiter to split the string. For example, to split a string based on commas, you can pass the comma character as an argument to the split() method:

text = "Hello,how,are,you?"
words = text.split(',')
print(words)

Output:

['Hello', 'how', 'are', 'you?']

Step 5: Handling Leading and Trailing Whitespace​

The split() method also handles leading and trailing whitespace. For example:

text = "   Hello, how are you?   "
words = text.split()
print(words)

Output:

['Hello,', 'how', 'are', 'you?']

As you can see, the leading and trailing whitespace is automatically removed when splitting the string.

Step 6: Conclusion​

In this tutorial, we learned how to split a string into words in Python using the split() method. We explored different ways to specify delimiters and how to handle leading and trailing whitespace. The split() method is a very useful tool for manipulating and analyzing text data in Python.