parse.py

#Context Managers autoclose file
with open(sourcefile,'r') as infile, open(targetfile,'w') as outfile:
    # split on your search string
    # if not found list of length 1
    # if found list with two strings either size
    line_iterator = (str(line).split("recap?id=") for line in infile) # generator lazy evaluation
    
    # take the second item in the list
    # ignore the first len(search_str) characters
    ids = len ( line[1][searchlen:] for line in line_iterator if len(line) > 1)
    
    for id in ids:
      outfile.write(game_id)
      outfile.write("\n")
      
    print ( str( len( ids )  +  " : records written")
    print ("Parse end")