Curious to see alternate approach on a search/replace via regex

[Roy Smith]

In article <mailman.1425.1360186878.2939.python-list at python.org>,
 rh <richard_hubbe11 at lavabit.com> wrote:

> I am curious to know if others would have done this differently. And if so
> how so?
> 
> This converts a url to a more easily managed filename, stripping the
> http protocol off. 

I would have used the urlparse module.

http://docs.python.org/2/library/urlparse.html