Python: Trying to loop through a string to find matching characters - python-2.7

Question

I am trying to create a simple "guess the word" game in Python. My output is something like:
String: _____ _____
Guess a word: 'e'
String:_e__o __e_e
Guess a word: 'h'
(and so on)
String: hello there
I have a function to do this, and within this function I have this code:
def guessing(word):
count = 0
blanks = "_" * len(word)
letters_used = "" #empty string
while count<len(word):
guess = raw_input("Guess a letter:")
blanks = list(blanks)
#Checks if guesses are valid
if len(guess) != 1:
print "Please guess only one letter at a time."
elif guess not in ("abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz "):
print "Please only guess letters!"
#Checks if guess is found in word
if guess in word and guess not in letters_used:
x = word.index(guess)
for x in blanks:
blanks[x] = guess
letters_used += guess
print ("".join(blanks))
print "Number of misses remaining:", len(word)-counter
print "There are", str(word.count(guess)) + str(guess)
guess is the raw input I get from the user for a guess, and letters_used is just a collection of guesses that the user has already input. What I'm trying to do is loop through blanks based on the word.index(guess). Unfortunately, this returns:
Guess a letter: e
e___
Yes, there are 1e
Help would be much appreciated!

Answer 1

Your code was almost correct. There were few mistakes which I have corrected:
def find_all(needle, haystack):
"""
Finds all occurances of the string `needle` in the string `haystack`
To be invoked like this - `list(find_all('l', 'hello'))` => #[2, 3]
"""
start = 0
while True:
start = haystack.find(needle, start)
if start == -1: return
yield start
start += 1
def guessing(word):
letters_uncovered_count = 0
blanks = "_" * len(word)
blanks = list(blanks)
letters_used = ""
while letters_uncovered_count < len(word):
guess = raw_input("Guess a letter:")
#Checks if guesses are valid
if len(guess) != 1:
print "Please guess only one letter at a time."
elif guess not in ("abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz"):
print "Please only guess letters!"
if guess in letters_used:
print("This character has already been guessed correctly before!")
continue
#Checks if guess is found in word
if guess in word:
guess_positions = list(find_all(guess, word))
for guess_position in guess_positions:
blanks[x] = guess
letters_uncovered_count += 1
letters_used += guess
print ("".join(blanks))
print "Number of misses remaining:", len(word)-letters_uncovered_count
print "There are", str(word.count(guess)) + str(guess)
else:
print("Wrong guess! Try again!")