Search list of string elements that match another list of string elements

Question

I have a list with strings called names, I need to search each element in the names list with each element from the pattern list. Found several guides that can loop through for a individual string but not for a list of strings

a = [x for x in names if 'st' in x]

Thank you in advance!

names = ['chris', 'christopher', 'bob', 'bobby', 'kristina']
pattern = ['st', 'bb']

Desired output:

a = ['christopher', 'bobby', 'kristina]

Answer 1

Use the any() function with a generator expression:

a = [x for x in names if any(pat in x for pat in pattern)]

any() is a short-circuiting function, so the first time it comes across a pattern that matches, it returns True. Since I am using a generator expression instead of a list comprehension, no patterns after the first pattern that matches are even checked. That means that this is just about the fastest possible way of doing it.

Answer 2

You can do something like this:

[name for name in names if any([p in name for p in pattern])]

The code is self explanatory, just read it out loud; we're creating a list of all names that have one of the patterns in them.

Using two loops:

for name in names:
    for pattern in patterns:
        if pattern in name:
            # append to result