Finding Acronyms Using Regex In Python

Question

I'm trying to use regex in Python to match acronyms separated by periods. I have the following code: ``` import re test_string = "U.S.A." pattern = r'([A-Z]\.)+' print re.findall(pattern, test_string) ``` The result of this is: ``` ['A.'] ``` I'm confused as to why this is the result. I know + is greedy, but why is are the first occurrences of [A-Z]\. ignored?

Accepted Answer

The `(...)` in regex creates a group. I suggest changing to:

```
pattern = r'(?:[A-Z]\.)+'
```

Finding Acronyms Using Regex In Python

Solution

Problem