Step by Step solution about How to resolve the algorithm Strip block comments step by step in the Python programming language

This code provides a function, commentstripper, to remove block comments from a given text. Block comments are typically enclosed within /* and */ delimiters in programming languages like C and C++.

Here's a breakdown of the code:

1. _commentstripper Function:

   • This is a helper function for the commentstripper function.
   • It takes two arguments:
     • txt: The text from which to remove the block comment.
     • delim: A tuple containing the opening and closing comment delimiters (e.g., ('/*', '*/')).
   • It searches for the opening delimiter in the text and, if found, removes the text between the delimiters and continues recursively to remove any nested block comments.

2. commentstripper Function:

   • This is the main function for stripping block comments.
   • It takes two arguments:
     • txt: The text from which to remove the block comments.
     • delim (optional): The delimiter tuple.
   • It iteratively calls the _commentstripper function until no more opening comment delimiters are found in the text.

3. test Function:

   • This is a test function to demonstrate the functionality of the commentstripper function.
   • It provides two sample strings containing non-nested and nested block comments.
   • It prints the stripped text for each sample.

4. if __name__ == '__main__' Block:

   • This is a standard Python idiom used to define a main function.
   • In this case, it calls the test function when the script is run as the main program.

Example Usage: To use the commentstripper function, you can import it into your Python program and call it with the text containing block comments.

• To strip all block comments, you can call:

stripped_text = commentstripper(text)

• To strip block comments using specific delimiters, such as '#' for single-line comments and ('{', '}') for multi-line comments in Python:

stripped_text = commentstripper(text, delim=('"""','"""'))

def _commentstripper(txt, delim):
    'Strips first nest of block comments'
    
    deliml, delimr = delim
    out = ''
    if deliml in txt:
        indx = txt.index(deliml)
        out += txt[:indx]
        txt = txt[indx+len(deliml):]
        txt = _commentstripper(txt, delim)
        assert delimr in txt, 'Cannot find closing comment delimiter in ' + txt
        indx = txt.index(delimr)
        out += txt[(indx+len(delimr)):]
    else:
        out = txt
    return out

def commentstripper(txt, delim=('/*', '*/')):
    'Strips nests of block comments'
    
    deliml, delimr = delim
    while deliml in txt:
        txt = _commentstripper(txt, delim)
    return txt


def test():
    print('\nNON-NESTED BLOCK COMMENT EXAMPLE:')
    sample = '''  /**
   * Some comments
   * longer comments here that we can parse.
   *
   * Rahoo 
   */
   function subroutine() {
    a = /* inline comment */ b + c ;
   }
   /*/ <-- tricky comments */

   /**
    * Another comment.
    */
    function something() {
    }'''
    print(commentstripper(sample))

    print('\nNESTED BLOCK COMMENT EXAMPLE:')
    sample = '''  /**
   * Some comments
   * longer comments here that we can parse.
   *
   * Rahoo 
   *//*
   function subroutine() {
    a = /* inline comment */ b + c ;
   }
   /*/ <-- tricky comments */
   */
   /**
    * Another comment.
    */
    function something() {
    }'''
    print(commentstripper(sample))
    
if __name__ == '__main__':
    test()