Pandas fuzzy join

fuzzy_join.py

import difflib

# input data
df1 = DataFrame([[1],[2],[3],[4],[5]], index=['one','two','three','four','five'], columns=['number'])
df2 = DataFrame([['a'],['b'],['c'],['d'],['e']], index=['one','too','three','fours','five'], columns=['letter'])

# want to obtain:
#        number letter
# one         1      a
# two         2      b
# three       3      c
# four        4      d
# five        5      e

df2.index = df2.index.map(lambda x: difflib.get_close_matches(x, df1.index)[0])

df1.join(df2)