added function to replace strings

figurefirst/__init__.py

@@ -2,4 +2,5 @@
 #reload(svg_to_axes)
 from . import mpl_functions
 from .svg_to_axes import FigureLayout
-from . import mpl_fig_to_figurefirst_svg
+from . import mpl_fig_to_figurefirst_svg
+from . import svg_util

figurefirst/svg_util.py

@@ -0,0 +1,16 @@
+#utility functions for dealing with svg files.
+
+def replace_non_unique(in_filename,out_filename,
+                       search_string = 'text_to_replace',
+                       prefix = ''):
+    """parse the document 'in_filename' and replace all 
+    instances of the string 'search_string' with the 
+    unique string 'prefix_x' where x is the occurance
+    of the search_string"""
+    with open(in_filename,'rt') as inf:
+        strdta = inf.read()
+        n_instances = strdta.count(search_string)
+        for i in range(n_instances):
+            strdta = strdta.replace(search_string, prefix + '_%s'%(i), 1)
+        with open(out_filename,'wt') as outf:
+            outf.write(strdta)