Use Python format string in reverse for parsing

Question

I've been using the following python code to format an integer part ID as a formatted part number string:

pn = 'PN-{:0>9}'.format(id) 

I would like to know if there is a way to use that same format string ('PN-{:0>9}') in reverse to extract the integer ID from the formatted part number. If that can't be done, is there a way to use a single format string (or regex?) to create and parse?

Answer 1

The parse module "is the opposite of format()".

Example usage:

>>> import parse >>> format_string = 'PN-{:0>9}' >>> id = 123 >>> pn = format_string.format(id) >>> pn 'PN-000000123' >>> parsed = parse.parse(format_string, pn) >>> parsed <Result ('123',) {}> >>> parsed[0] '123'