How to create a SPACE between word and open bracket in list of sentences

user_11695788 0
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In below list, there are actually two dupes. But due to difference of SPACE between second word of sentence and (, its treating them as unique sentences.

By using Python - Regular Expressions, how to create addition space between words. (example: 1st item) 'United States(US)', should be changed to 'United States (US)' (same as 2nd item)

listx = 
['United States(US)',
 'United States (US)',
 'New York(NY)',
 'New York (NY)']

Expected Output list is 

['United States (US)',
 'United States (US)',
 'New York (NY)',
 'New York (NY)']

Actually, i am trying eliminate duplicate sentences from the list and considering this is one of the approach by making the sentences similar first. Please suggest.

python-re nltk list python regex
3 Answers

You can search for a letter immediately followed by an open parentheses

>>> [re.sub(r'(\w)\(', r'\1 (', i) for i in listx]
['United States (US)',
 'United States (US)',
 'New York (NY)',
 'New York (NY)']

To remove the duplicates you can create a set from this generator expression

>>> set(re.sub(r'(\w)\(', r'\1 (', i) for i in listx)
{'United States (US)', 'New York (NY)'}
user_22964580

You can try this. You can use re.sub here.

listx = ['United States(US)', 'United States (US)', 'New York(NY)', 'New York (NY)']

[re.sub(r'.(\(.*\))',r' \1',i) for i in listx]
# ['United State (US)', 'United States (US)', 'New Yor (NY)', 'New York (NY)']

Regex pattern explanation:

  • . to match any character
  • ( start of group bracket
  • \( match (
  • .* match greedily.
  • ' \1' sub the match group with space the matched group.
  • regex live demo
user_124164530

You can do

    new_listx = ["{} {}".format(re.match('(.*)(\(.*\))', i).group(1).rstrip() ,re.match('(.*)(\(.*\))', i).group(2)) for i in listx]
    print(new_listx)

Output

['United States (US)', 'United States (US)', 'New York (NY)', 'New York (NY)']

The regex is splitting the text to 2 groups one is before the () and the second in the () after that it's trimming the space form the right of the first group.
then you can do

print(set(new_listx))

and you will get a unique values set.

{'New York (NY)', 'United States (US)'}
user_131012390
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