Python Regular Expression to Edit First Comment

Question

I am writing a python script to edit only the first comment block in my files. I have a comment block that looks like this:

############################
##
## Comment to 
## be changed
##
############################

############################
## Don't want to change
############################

I am trying to write a regular expression to only find the first comment block and replace it so it looks like this:

############################
##
## Comment has 
## been changed
##
############################

############################
## Don't want to change
############################

As of right now I have:

editedCommentFile = re.sub(r'\#{2,150}.*?\#{2,150}.*?\s*', replString, searchedString, 1, re.DOTALL)

Unfortunately this only matches the first row of '#' and the 3 characters of the next line '## '. It looks like this:

############################
##
## Comment has 
## been changed
##
############################ Comment to
## be changed
##
############################

############################
## Don't want to change
############################

I am thinking that somehow I need the regex to stop pattern matching once it reaches the blank newline between the first comment block and the next. Any help would be appreciated.

Answer 1

Use \#{3,150} to require 3-or-more # characters:

import re

searchedString = '''\
############################
##
## Comment to 
## be changed
##
############################

############################
## Don't want to change
############################'''


replString = '''\
############################
##
## Comment has 
## been changed
##
############################'''

editedCommentFile = re.sub(r'\#{2,150}.*?\#{3,150}', replString, 
                           searchedString, 1, re.DOTALL)

print(editedCommentFile)

yields

############################
##
## Comment has 
## been changed
##
############################

############################
## Don't want to change
############################

---

When you use \#{2,150} then r'\#{2,150}.*?\#{2,150}' prematurely matches

############################
##

which is why you would get

############################
##
## Comment has 
## been changed
##
############################
## Comment to 
## be changed
##
############################

instead.