Pythonでスペースを削除する方法

a='     ddd dfe dfd     efre    ddd   '
a
'     ddd dfe dfd     efre    ddd   '

a.strip()
'ddd dfe dfd     efre    ddd'

In[5]: a.lstrip()
Out[5]: 'ddd dfe dfd     efre    ddd   '

In[6]: a.rstrip()
Out[6]: '     ddd dfe dfd     efre    ddd'

In[7]: a.replace(' ','')
Out[7]: 'ddddfedfdefreddd'

In[8]: a.split()
Out[8]: ['ddd', 'dfe', 'dfd', 'efre', 'ddd']

In[3]: a = 'dfdfd*dfjdf**fdjfd*22*'
In[4]: a
Out[4]: 'dfdfd*dfjdf**fdjfd*22*'
In[5]: a.split('*')
Out[5]: ['dfdfd', 'dfjdf', '', 'fdjfd', '22', '']
In[6]: a.split('*',2)
Out[6]: ['dfdfd', 'dfjdf', '*fdjfd*22*']

>>> re.split(r'\s+', 'a b   c')
['a', 'b', 'c']