removing extra space is common task in application development the strip(function performs this task well the center(function lets you add padding to both the left and right side of string so that it consumes desired amount of space when you combine the strip(and center(functionsthe output is different from when you use the center(function alone you can combine functions to produce desired result python executes each of the functions one at time from left to right the order in which the functions appear will affect the outputand developers commonly make the mistake of putting the functions in the wrong order if your output is different from what you expectedtry changing the function order some functions work on the string as an input rather than on the string instance the max(function falls into this category if you had typed mystring max()python would have displayed an error the bulleted list that appears earlier in this section shows which functions require this sort of string input when working with functions that produce list as an outputyou can access an individual member by providing an index to it the example shows how to use split(to split the string into substrings it then shows how to access just the first substring in the list you find out more about working with lists in choose runrun module you see python shell window open the application outputs number of modified stringsas shown in figure - figure - using functions makes string manipu lation lot more flexible