在python中匹配以特定字符开头的行块

Question

I would like to search through a block of text and match the lines starting with a specific character in python- but want to stop as soon as that rule is broken.

For example, in the following text: (starting with asterisks)

---

* point one

* point two

** point two.one

* last point three

But here is a text in between

* four

---

I would like to stop the search as soon as encountering the non-bulleted text. Ie the search/find should return only the text up to "* last point three".

I have been trying with various regex but with no luck. The closest I have got so far is

r'(^[*(**)].*)'

Any help will be appreciated.

Thanks

tjr

Answer 1

You can use the following regex to get those blocks:

^(?:\*+[^*\n]*?\n*(?=\*))*\*+[^*\n]*?(?:\n|$)(?!\*)

See demo

Answer 2

You mean this,

re.findall(r'^(?s)\\*[^\n]*(?:\n\\\*[^\n]*)*', s)

DEMO

Answer 3

If the goal is simply to match up to the first point in the stream where the condition is not true, it seems like the most concise way to express this is

>>> pattern = r'^(?s)\*[^\n]*(?:\n+\*[^\n]*)*'

>>> target = """* point one
...
... * point two
...
... ** point two.one
...
... * last point three
...
... But here is a text in between
...
... * four
... """
>>> m=re.search(pattern,target)
>>> m.group(0)
'* point one\n\n* point two\n\n** point two.one\n\n* last point three'