python - Get first letter of a string from column

Question

I'm fighting with pandas and for now I'm loosing. I have source table similar to this:

import pandas as pd

a=pd.Series([123,22,32,453,45,453,56])
b=pd.Series([234,4353,355,453,345,453,56])
df=pd.concat([a, b], axis=1)
df.columns=['First', 'Second']

I would like to add new column to this data frame with first digit from values in column 'First': a) change number to string from column 'First' b) extracting first character from newly created string c) Results from b save as new column in data frame

I don't know how to apply this to the pandas data frame object. I would be grateful for helping me with that.

Answer 1

Cast the dtype of the col to str and you can perform vectorised slicing calling str:

In [29]:
df['new_col'] = df['First'].astype(str).str[0]
df

Out[29]:
   First  Second new_col
0    123     234       1
1     22    4353       2
2     32     355       3
3    453     453       4
4     45     345       4
5    453     453       4
6     56      56       5

if you need to you can cast the dtype back again calling astype(int) on the column