How to convert a string into a list in python ?

Examples of how to convert a string in a list in python:

Change a string representation of a list into a list

To convert a string representation of a list into a list in python, a solution is to use ast.literal_eval, illustration:

>>> s = '[1,2,3,4]'
>>> type(s)
<class 'str'>
>>> import ast
>>> l = ast.literal_eval(s)
>>> type(l)
<class 'list'>
>>> l[1]
2

Put all string elements into a list:

Example of how to put all string elements into a list using the "list comprehension" approach:

>>> s = 'Salut, comment ca va ?. Bien, et toi ?.'
>>> l = [i for i in s]
>>> l
['S', 'a', 'l', 'u', 't', ',', ' ', 'c', 'o', 'm', 'm', 'e', 'n', 't', ' ', 'c', 'a', ' ', 'v', 'a', ' ', '?', '.', ' ', 'B', 'i', 'e', 'n', ',', ' ', 'e', 't', ' ', 't', 'o', 'i', ' ', '?', '.']

Put elements separated by a space in a list

To put elements separated by a space in a list under python, a solution is to use the built-in python function called split(), example:

>>> s = 'Salut, comment ca va ?. Bien, et toi ?.'
>>> l = s.split()
>>> l
['Salut,', 'comment', 'ca', 'va', '?.', 'Bien,', 'et', 'toi', '?.']

Put elements separated by a coma in a list

To put elements separated by a coma in a list under python, a solution is to use the built-in python function called split(), example:

>>> l = s.split(',')
>>> l
['Salut', ' comment ca va ?. Bien', ' et toi ?.']

Put elements separated by a point in a list

To put elements separated by a point in a list under python, a solution is to use the built-in python function called split(), example:

>>> l = s.split('.')
>>> l
['Salut, comment ca va ?', ' Bien, et toi ?', '']

Note: remove elements from the list

Note: to remove elements from the list (example remove the coma):

>>> [i.replace(',','') for i in l]
['Salut comment ca va ?', ' Bien et toi ?', '']

References