content between <p> and </p>

p_in_html.py

def txt_wrap_by(begin, end, html):
    if not html:
        return ''
    start = html.find(begin)
    if start >= 0:
        start += len(begin)
        end = html.find(end, start)
        if end >= 0:
            return html[start:end].strip()

def txt_wrap_by_all(begin, end, html):
    if not html:
        return ''
    result = []
    from_pos = 0
    while True:
        start = html.find(begin, from_pos)
        if start >= 0:
            start += len(begin)
            endpos = html.find(end, start)
            if endpos >= 0:
                result.append(html[start:endpos].strip())
                from_pos = endpos+len(end)
                continue
        break
    return result

for p in txt_wrap_by_all('<p>', '</p>', html):
    print p

result

$ python test.py 
1.34135603905 txt_wrap_by_all
2.01093912125 re_findall
82 82

test.py

import re
import timeit

def txt_wrap_by_all(begin, end, html):
    if not html:
        return ''
    result = []
    from_pos = 0
    while True:
        start = html.find(begin, from_pos)
        if start >= 0:
            start += len(begin)
            endpos = html.find(end, start)
            if endpos >= 0:
                result.append(html[start:endpos])
                from_pos = endpos+len(end)
                continue
        break
    return result

def re_findall(html):
    return re.findall(r'''<p>(.*?)</p>''', html, re.S)
    

if __name__ == '__main__':
    html = open('index.html').read()
    t1 = timeit.Timer("txt_wrap_by_all('<p>', '</p>', html)", "from __main__ import txt_wrap_by_all,html")
    t2 = timeit.Timer("re_findall(html)", "from __main__ import re_findall,html")
    
    print t1.timeit(1000), 'txt_wrap_by_all'
    print t2.timeit(1000), 're_findall'
    
    print len(txt_wrap_by_all('<p>', '</p>', html)), len(re_findall(html))