parse WhatsApp exported chat

parse_whatsapp_exported_chat.py

import re

datetime_pattern = r'\d{2}/\d{2}/\d{2}, \d{1,2}:\d{2}\s?[ap]m'
name_pattern = r'[A-Za-z ]*'
message_pattern = r'.*'

pattern = re.compile(f'({datetime_pattern}) - ({name_pattern}): ({message_pattern})')

def get_chats(path):
  with open(path, 'r') as f:
    chat_lines = f.read().split('\n')
  chats = []
  for line in chat_lines:
    match = re.findall(pattern, line.replace('\u202f', ' '))
    if len(match):
      chats.append(list(match[0]))
    elif len(chats):
      # attach line to previous chat message
      prev_chat_content = chats[-1][-1]
      chats[-1][-1] = prev_chat_content + '\n' + line
  return chats

chats = get_chats('chat.txt')

for chat in chats:  
  print(chat)