Parsing strings -> numbers

[Skip Montanaro]

    tuanglen> I've been looking all over in the docs, but I can't figure out
    tuanglen> how you're *supposed* to parse formatted strings into numbers
    tuanglen> (and other data types, for that matter) in Python.

Check out the locale module.  From "pydoc locale":

    Help on module locale:

    NAME
        locale - Locale support.

    FILE
        /Users/skip/local/lib/python2.4/locale.py

    MODULE DOCS
        http://www.python.org/doc/current/lib/module-locale.html

    DESCRIPTION
        The module provides low-level access to the C lib's locale APIs
        and adds high level number formatting APIs as well as a locale
        aliasing engine to complement these.

    ...

    FUNCTIONS
        atof(str, func=<type 'float'>)
            Parses a string as a float according to the locale settings.

        atoi(str)
            Converts a string to an integer according to the locale settings.

    ...

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