Replace slice of string python with string of different size, but maintain structure - string

Question

so today I was working on a function that removes any quoted strings from a chunk of data, and replaces them with format areas instead ({0}, {1}, etc...).
I ran into a problem, because the output was becoming completely scrambled, as in a {1} was going in a seemingly random place.
I later found out that this was a problem because the replacement of slices in the list changed the list so that it's length was different, and so the previous re matches would not line up (it only worked for the first iteration).
the gathering of the strings worked perfectly, as expected, as this is most certainly not a problem with re.
I've read about mutable sequences, and a bunch of other things as well, but was not able to find anything on this.
what I think i need is something like str.replace but can take slices, instead of a substring.
here is my code:
import re
def rm_strings_from_data(data):
regex = re.compile(r'"(.*?)"')
s = regex.finditer(data)
list_data = list(data)
val = 0
strings = []
for i in s:
string = i.group()
start, end = i.span()
strings.append(string)
list_data[start:end] = '{%d}' % val
val += 1
print(strings, ''.join(list_data), sep='\n\n')
if __name__ == '__main__':
rm_strings_from_data('[hi="hello!" thing="a thing!" other="other thing"]')
i get:
['"hello!"', '"a thing!"', '"other thing"']
[hi={0} thing="a th{1}r="other thing{2}
I would like the output:
['"hello!"', '"a thing!"', '"other thing"']
[hi={0} thing={1} other={2}]
any help would be appreciated. thanks for your time :)

Answer 1

Why not match both key=value parts using regex capture groups like this: (\w+?)=(".*?")
Then it becomes very easy to assemble the lists as needed.
Sample Code:
import re
def rm_strings_from_data(data):
regex = re.compile(r'(\w+?)=(".*?")')
matches = regex.finditer(data)
strings = []
list_data = []
for matchNum, match in enumerate(matches):
matchNum = matchNum + 1
strings.append(match.group(2))
list_data.append((match.group(1) + '={' + str(matchNum) + '} '))
print(strings, '[' + ''.join(list_data) + ']', sep='\n\n')
if __name__ == '__main__':
rm_strings_from_data('[hi="hello!" thing="a thing!" other="other thing"]')