In my earlier article, I covered Python numeric and String variables. Python supports several String operations. In this article, I will be demonstrating the Python String operations

Introduction

You can create String variables by simply assigning a String value to the variable name. The String variable can be enclosed either in single quotes or double quotes. The following code demonstrates this:

a = 'Hello'
b = "world"

This code creates two String variables aand b

How Python treats Strings

Python treats Strings as a sequence of character. The first character is at position 0 and the last character is at a position which is equal to the length of the String -1. In addition, the end of the String is considered to be at -1 position.

For example consider the String “Hello World”. In forward direction the character ‘H’ is at position 0 and the character ‘d’ is at position 10. In the backward direction, the character ‘d’ is at position -1 and the character ‘H’ is at position -11.

Slice Operator

The slice operator helps to create substrings. It consists of [] or [:]. In order to create sun-strings, you need to specify the position within the slice operator. The following code demonstrates this:

str = 'This is a Java program'

print(str[0])
print(str[0:4])
print(str[10:])
print(str[:4])
print(str[-1])
print(str[5:-1])
print(str[-7:-1])

This code prints the following output:

T
This
Java program
This
m
is a Java progra
progra

Concatenation Operator

Just like in Java, the ‘+’ operator acts as the concatenation operator. It helps in concatenating Strings. The following code demonstrates this:

str1='Hello'
str2 = ' World'
str3 = str1+str2
print(str3)

This code prints the following output:

Hello World

Repetition Operator

The repetition operator(*) helps to repeat a String. You need to specify the String to be repeated, followed by the repetition operator, followed by the number of times the String should be repeated. The following code demonstrates this:

str1='Hello '
str2 = str1*5
print(str2)

This code repeats the String “Hello “ 5 times. So this code prints the following output:

Hello Hello Hello Hello Hello

Further Learning

• The Python Masterclass
• Everything you need to know about Python
• Python for beginners
• Python for finance

Conclusion

So in this article, we took at look at the String operations supported by Python. We understood the slice operator, concatenation operator and the repetition operator.