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find position in a list made by string by searching incomplete string

• To: mathgroup at smc.vnet.net
• Subject: [mg130338] find position in a list made by string by searching incomplete string
• From: Joug Raw <jougraw at gmail.com>
• Date: Wed, 3 Apr 2013 22:50:17 -0400 (EDT)
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I have a list of strings like
list1={{"a", "b    something", "a", "a", "b", "c", "b"}
In this list, 'something' is a sting that I will not know in advanced and
there are several spaces between the 'b' and the 'something' in one string.
The number of the spaces is unknown.

I want to find out the position of the this "b   something" sting in the
list. So, I did,

Position[list1, "b*"]

and I also tried,
Position[list1,"b"~~___ ]

both of them gave me {} as results.

Also Cases[list1,"b"~~___] or Cases[list1, "b*"] does not work. I can get
the correct position only if I give the exact "b    something" as the
searching pattern. What is the easiest way to search with a incomplete
string pattern in this case? Thanks for your help.

• Follow-Ups:
  • Re: find position in a list made by string by searching
    • From: Bob Hanlon <hanlonr357@gmail.com>