Other Useful Methods

This example program introduces four more useful string methods: replace(), upper(), lower(), and split().  

Example script: other_methods_intro

  • Enter this script and save it as other_methods_intro.  
  • Flash the script into the micro:bit.
# other_methods_intro

from microbit import *

sleep(1000)

string = "This is a string.  It is a sequence of characters!"
print("Original string:", string)
print()

lower_case = string.lower()
upper_case = string.upper()

print("lower_case =", lower_case)
print("upper_case =", upper_case)
print()

new_string = string.replace("It", "A string")

print("new_string =", new_string)
print()

new_list = string.split()

print("new list =", new_list)
print()
  • Open the terminal.
  • Verify that it displays the original string, the lower and uppercase versions, a version that replaced "It" with "A string", and a list with all the substrings that were separated by spaces in the original.

How other_methods_intro Works

The first routine declares a string, names it string, and then prints it for reference.

string = "This is a string.  It is a sequence of characters!"
print("Original string:", string)
print()

The string.lower() and string.upper() methods return lower and upper case versions of the original string, and print them:

lower_case = string.lower()
upper_case = string.upper()

print("lower_case =", lower_case)
print("upper_case =", upper_case)
print()

The string.replace() method is another way to replace parts of a string.  It’s not as straightforward as the approach from the previous String Surgery section, because it would replace all instances that matche the substring, if there were more than one "It".  

new_string = string.replace("It", "A string")

print("new_string =", new_string)
print()

The string.split() method splits a string with separators into substrings.  By default, the separator is a space, but you could pass it a comma, for example.  Many data strings are comma delimited, and need to be split before each individual data item can be examined.

new_list = string.split()

print("new list =", new_list)
print()