How To Use RegEx In An If Statement In Python?

I'm doing something like 'Syntax Analyzer' with Kivy, using re (regular expresions). I only want to check a valid syntax for basic operations (like +|-|*|/|(|)). The user tape the

Solution 1:

Your regex always matches because it allows the empty string to match (since the entire regex is enclosed in an optional group.

If you test this live on regex101.com, you can immediately see this and also that it doesn't match the entire string but only parts of it.

I've already corrected two errors in your character classes concerning the use of unnecessary/harmful alternation operators (|) and incorrect placement of the dash, making it into a range operator (-), but it's still incorrect.

I think you want something more like this:

^               # Make sure the match begins at the start of the string
(?:             # Start a non-capturing group that matches...
    -?          # an optional minus sign,
    \d+         # one or more digits
    (?:\.\d+)?  # an optional group that contains a dot and one or more digits.
    (?:         # Start of a non-capturing group that either matches...
       [+*/-]   # an operator
    |           # or
       $        # the end of the string.
    )           # End of inner non-capturing group
)+              # End of outer non-capturing group, required to match at least once.
(?<![+*/-])     # Make sure that the final character isn't an operator.
$               # Make sure that the match ends at the end of the string.

Test it live on regex101.com.

Solution 2:

This answers your question about how to use if with regex:
Caveat: the regex formula will not weed out all invalid inputs, e.g., two decimal points (".."), two operators ("++"), and such. So please adjust it to suit your exact needs)

import re

regex = re.compile(r"[\d.+\-*\/]+")

input_list = [
    "53.22+22.11+10*555+62+55.2-66", "a53.22+22.11+10*555+62+55.2-66",
    "53.22+22.pq11+10*555+62+55.2-66", "53.22+22.11+10*555+62+55.2-66zz",
]

for input_str in input_list:
    mmm = regex.match(input_str)
    if mmm and input_str == mmm.group():
        print('Valid: ', input_str)
    else:
        print('Invalid: ', input_str)

Above as a function for use with a single string instead of a list:

import re
regex = re.compile(r"[\d.+\-*\/]+")

def check_for_valid_string(in_string=""):
    mmm = regex.match(in_string)
    if mmm and in_string == mmm.group():
        return 'Valid: ', in_string
    return 'Invalid: ', in_string

check_for_valid_string('53.22+22.11+10*555+62+55.2-66')
check_for_valid_string('a53.22+22.11+10*555+62+55.2-66')
check_for_valid_string('53.22+22.pq11+10*555+62+55.2-66')
check_for_valid_string('53.22+22.11+10*555+62+55.2-66zz')

Output:

## Valid:  53.22+22.11+10*555+62+55.2-66
## Invalid:  a53.22+22.11+10*555+62+55.2-66
## Invalid:  53.22+22.pq11+10*555+62+55.2-66
## Invalid:  53.22+22.11+10*555+62+55.2-66zz