Count the number of elements in a string separated by comma

Question

I am dealing with text strings such as the following: LN1 2DW, DN21 5BJ, DN21 5BL, ...

In Python, how can I count the number of elements between commas? Each element can be made of 6, 7, or 8 characters, and in my example there are 3 elements shown. The separator is always a comma.

I have never done anything related to text mining so this would be a start for me.

Answer 1

If the comma (,) is the separator, you can simply use str.split on the string and then len(..) on the result:

text = 'LN1 2DW, DN21 5BJ, DN21 5B'
number = len(text.split(','))

You can also reuse the list of elements. For instance:

text = 'LN1 2DW, DN21 5BJ, DN21 5B'
tags = text.split(',')
number = len(tags)
#do something with the `tags`