Structured Output Parser

mediumPROPrompt Engineering & ParsingLLM 3: Applications & Evaluation

Parse structured key-value output from an LLM response.

LLMs often produce structured output with labeled fields. Parse a response into a dictionary where each line has the format "Key: Value".

Input:

Multi-line text (each line is "Key: Value")
Last line: comma-separated list of required keys

Output: For each required key (in order given), print the value. Print "MISSING" for keys not found.

Matching is case-insensitive for keys. Extra whitespace should be stripped.

Example

Input

Name: Alice
Age: 30
City: New York
Name,Age,Email

Output

Alice
30
MISSING

Reasoning

The input is parsed into a dictionary with case-insensitive keys, resulting in: name: Alice, age: 30, city: New York
The last line is split into a list of required keys: Name, Age, Email
For each required key, the corresponding value is looked up in the dictionary, with case-insensitive matching, and printed: Alice for Name, 30 for Age
Since Email is not found in the dictionary, MISSING is printed for that key

Constraints

Key matching is case-insensitive
Strip whitespace from keys and values
Lines without ":" are skipped
Required keys are comma-separated on the last input line

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Background Knowledge

The problem of parsing structured output from a Large Language Model (LLM) response involves understanding the format of the input data and how to extract relevant information from it. In this case, the input consists of multi-line text where each line is in the format "Key: Value", followed by a line containing a comma-separated list of required keys. The task is to parse this input into a dictionary and then print the values for each required key. Key-value parsing is a fundamental concept in computer science, and it's essential to understand how to work with dictionaries and string manipulation in programming.

To approach this problem, one needs to be familiar with string processing techniques, such as splitting strings, stripping whitespace, and performing case-insensitive matching. Additionally, understanding how to work with dictionaries (or hash tables) is crucial, as they provide an efficient way to store and look up key-value pairs. The problem also requires attention to detail, as the matching is case-insensitive, and extra whitespace should be stripped from the input.

The concept of parsing is also relevant here, as it involves analyzing the input data and extracting meaningful information from it. In this case, the parsing involves splitting the input into individual lines, extracting the key-value pairs, and storing them in a dictionary. The problem can be solved using a variety of programming languages, but the underlying concepts and techniques remain the same.

Algorithm/Approach

The general approach to solving this problem involves the following algorithm pattern:

Read the input data line by line
Parse each line into a key-value pair
Store the key-value pairs in a dictionary
Read the last line containing the required keys
Iterate over the required keys and print the corresponding values from the dictionary

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solution.py

Python 3.13

Test results