import re def split_and_recombine_text(text, desired_length=200, max_length=300): """Split text it into chunks of a desired length trying to keep sentences intact.""" # normalize text, remove redundant whitespace and convert non-ascii quotes to ascii text = re.sub(r'\n\n+', '\n', text) text = re.sub(r'\s+', ' ', text) text = re.sub(r'[“”]', '"', text) rv = [] in_quote = False current = "" split_pos = [] pos = -1 def seek(delta): nonlocal pos, in_quote, text is_neg = delta < 0 for _ in range(abs(delta)): if is_neg: pos -= 1 else: pos += 1 if text[pos] == '"': in_quote = not in_quote return text[pos], text[pos+1] if pos < len(text)-1 else "" def commit(): nonlocal rv, current, split_pos rv.append(current) current = "" split_pos = [] while pos < len(text) - 1: c, next_c = seek(1) current += c # do we need to force a split? if len(current) >= max_length: if len(split_pos) > 0 and len(current) > (desired_length / 2): # we have at least one sentence and we are over half the desired length, seek back to the last split d = pos - split_pos[-1] seek(-d) current = current[:-d] else: # no full sentences, seek back until we are not in the middle of a word and split there while c not in '!?.\n ' and pos > 0 and len(current) > desired_length: c, _ = seek(-1) current = current[:-1] commit() # check for sentence boundaries elif not in_quote and (c in '!?\n' or (c == '.' and next_c in '\n ')): # seek forward if we have consecutive boundary markers but still within the max length while len(current) < max_length and next_c in '!?.': c, next_c = seek(1) current += c split_pos.append(pos) if len(current) >= desired_length: commit() rv.append(current) # clean up, remove lines with only whitespace or punctuation rv = [s.strip() for s in rv] rv = [s for s in rv if len(s) > 0 and not re.match(r'^[\s\.,;:!?]*$', s)] return rv if __name__ == '__main__': import unittest class Test(unittest.TestCase): def test_split_and_recombine_text(self): text = """ This is a sample sentence. This is another sample sentence. This is a longer sample sentence that should force a split inthemiddlebutinotinthislongword. "Don't split my quote... please" """ self.assertEqual(split_and_recombine_text(text, desired_length=20, max_length=40), ['This is a sample sentence.', 'This is another sample sentence.', 'This is a longer sample sentence that', 'should force a split', 'inthemiddlebutinotinthislongword.', '"Don\'t split my quote... please"']) def test_split_and_recombine_text_2(self): text = """ When you are really angry sometimes you use consecutive exclamation marks!!!!!! Is this a good thing to do?!?!?! I don't know but we should handle this situation.......................... """ self.assertEqual(split_and_recombine_text(text, desired_length=30, max_length=50), ['When you are really angry sometimes you use', 'consecutive exclamation marks!!!!!!', 'Is this a good thing to do?!?!?!', 'I don\'t know but we should handle this situation.']) unittest.main()