StringGenerator 0.4.0

Generate randomized strings of characters using a template

Generate test data, unique ids, passwords, vouchers or other randomized textual data very quickly using a template language. The template language is superficially similar to regular expressions but instead of defining how to match or capture strings, it defines how to generate randomized strings. A very simple invocation to produce a random string with word characters and digits of 10 characters length:

>>> import strgen
>>> strgen.StringGenerator("[\d\w]{10}").render()
'sj5ic8vebF'

Full documentation

The purpose of this module is to save the Python developer from having to write verbose code around the same pattern every time to generate passwords, keys, tokens, test data, etc. of this sort:

my_secret_key = ''.join(random.choice(string.ascii_uppercase + string.digits) for x in range(30))

that is:

1. Hard to read even at this simplistic level.

2. Hard to safely change quickly. Even modest additions to the requirements need unreasonably verbose solutions.

3. Doesn’t use safe encryption standards.

4. Doesn’t provide the implied minimal guarantees of character occurance.

5. Hard to track back to requirements (“must be between x and y in length and have characters from sets Q, R and S”).

The template uses short forms similar to those of regular expressions. An example template for generating a strong password:

[\w\p\d]{20}

will generate something like the following:

P{:45Ec5$3)2!I68x`{6

Guarantee at least two “special” characters in a string:

[\w\p]{10}&[\p]{2}

You can also generate useful test data, like fake emails with plenty of variation:

[\c]{10}.[\c]{5:10}@[\c]{3:12}.(com|net|org)

Requirements

From version 0.4.0, support for 2.x is dropped. If you still need support for Python 2, use version 0.3.4.

There are no dependencies beyond the Python Standard Library.

Installation

Install as standard for Python packages from PyPi:

pip install StringGenerator

License

Released under the BSD license.

Acknowledgements

Thanks to Robert LeBlanc who caught some important errors in escaping special characters. Thanks to Andreas Motl for the progress counter.

Original Author: [e-mail]