How To Use Split In For Loop In Python

In this tutorial, we will learn how to use the split method in a for loop in Python. This technique is useful when you need to process and manipulate text data, such as parsing CSV files or analyzing strings.

Python provides a powerful yet easy-to-use split method in strings that allows you to split a large string into a list of smaller strings based on a given delimiter.

Step 1: Understand the split method

The split() method in Python is a built-in method that is used to split a string into a list of substrings, based on the specified delimiter. By default, it takes whitespaces as the delimiter, although you can specify any separator or delimiters as an argument. Here’s a simple example:

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text = "Python is a great language"
words = text.split()
 
print(words)

Output:

['Python', 'is', 'a', 'great', 'language']

In the example above, the string was split using whitespace as the delimiter, and the substrings were stored in a list called words.

Step 2: Use the split method in a for loop

Now that we understand the basics of the split method, let’s see how to use it in a for loop for more complex scenarios. Suppose we have a CSV (Comma Separated Values) file containing some data like this:

example.csv:

Name, Age, City
John, 28, New York
Jane, 24, Los Angeles
Tom, 35, Chicago
Emily, 30, San Francisco

Using the split method with a for loop, we can read and process this data in Python. Here’s the step-by-step process:

  1. First, read the file and store its content in a list:
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with open('example.csv', 'r') as file:
    lines = file.readlines()
  1. Next, iterate through the list using a for loop and split each line using a comma as the delimiter:
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for line in lines:
    values = line.strip().split(',')
    print(values)

Output:

['Name', ' Age', ' City']
['John', ' 28', ' New York']
['Jane', ' 24', ' Los Angeles']
['Tom', ' 35', ' Chicago']
['Emily', ' 30', ' San Francisco']
  1. Finally, process the values further as needed. For example, you can store them in a dictionary with each value associated with its corresponding key (Name, Age, City):
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data = []
 
for line in lines[1:]:
    values = line.strip().split(',')
    data.append({'Name': values[0], 'Age': int(values[1]), 'City': values[2].strip()})
 
print(data)

Output:

[{'Name': 'John', 'Age': 28, 'City': 'New York'},
 {'Name': 'Jane', 'Age': 24, 'City': 'Los Angeles'},
 {'Name': 'Tom', 'Age': 35, 'City': 'Chicago'},
 {'Name': 'Emily', 'Age': 30, 'City': 'San Francisco'}]

Full Code

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with open('example.csv', 'r') as file:
    lines = file.readlines()
 
data = []
 
for line in lines[1:]:
    values = line.strip().split(',')
    data.append({'Name': values[0], 'Age': int(values[1]), 'City': values[2].strip()})
 
print(data)

Output:

[{'Name': 'John', 'Age': 28, 'City': 'New York'},
 {'Name': 'Jane', 'Age': 24, 'City': 'Los Angeles'},
 {'Name': 'Tom', 'Age': 35, 'City': 'Chicago'},
 {'Name': 'Emily', 'Age': 30, 'City': 'San Francisco'}]

Conclusion

In this tutorial, we learned how to use the split method in a for loop in Python to process and manipulate text data.

The split method is a powerful tool for parsing and analyzing strings, especially when dealing with structured data like CSV files.

By combining this method with a for loop, you can efficiently process large datasets and perform more advanced manipulation tasks.