8.11 Raw Strings

  • Backslash characters in strings introduce escape sequences—like \n for newline and \t for tab
  • To include a backslash in a string, use two backslash characters \\
  • Makes some strings difficult to read
  • Consider a Microsoft Windows file location:
In [5]:
file_path = 'C:\\MyFolder\\MySubFolder\\MyFile.txt'
In [6]:
file_path
Out[6]:
'C:\\MyFolder\\MySubFolder\\MyFile.txt'

8.11 Raw Strings (cont.)

  • raw strings—preceded by the character r—are more convenient
  • They treat each backslash as a regular character, rather than the beginning of an escape sequence
In [7]:
file_path = r'C:\MyFolder\MySubFolder\MyFile.txt'
In [8]:
file_path
Out[8]:
'C:\\MyFolder\\MySubFolder\\MyFile.txt'

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