Bip to Energymech IRC log converter

The great thing about knowing how to code is being able to build things that help you out.

I've recently had to convert some IRC logs from the Bip format to the Energymech format used by ZNC in order to be able to then generate some statistics from them using pisg.

My first approach was to hack together some macros and just plow through the logs (fortunately there weren't that many), but this had several downsides:

1. by using macros I had to take out certain data which could be used to generate statistics
2. it's a manual job and doesn't scale well time-wise, despite being able to automate it to some extent
3. can't be easily shared with others

After finishing parsing the logs I decided that it's best to make a learning experience out of it and code a Python script that goes through all the logs and generates the correct output; I knew it wasn't a difficult task (heck, I've thrown it together in around 3 hours of coding and debugging overall) so all I had to do was get cracking.

The largest issue I had with it was regarding the way Python handles regex substitution.

Thanks to the great wonder that is the Internet I could get an answer to my question in a couple of hours and continue on my marry way.

Another nice tip I got was to pre-compile the regex before going through the loop which speeds up things considerably when dealing with lots of text. It was as simple as a:

import re

talk_mask    = re.compile('\!.*?\:')
connect_mask = re.compile('\!.*?\has')
quit_info    = re.compile('\quit.*?\]')
find_nick    = re.compile('\<* .*?\!')
time_mask    = re.compile('([0-1]\d|2[0-3]):([0-5]\d):([0-5]\d)')

Download

I've of course made the code public. It can be found and downloaded from GitHub which is also the place to report bugs or make suggestions.