Regex? Match part of or whole word

Question

I was wondering if it\'s possible to use regex with python to capture a word, or a part of the word (if it\'s at the end of the string).

Eg:
target word - potato

Answer 1

Use the $ to match at the end of a string. For example, the following would match 'potato' only at the end of a string (first example):

"potato$"

This would match all of your examples:

"pota[to]{1,2}$"

However, some risk of also matching "potao" or "potaot".