Difference between revisions of "String exploding"

m (Added missing properties for the category page, the function itself "pollutes" lua's string table though.)
 
(2 intermediate revisions by 2 users not shown)
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original = table.concat(tbl, " ")
 
original = table.concat(tbl, " ")
 
print(original) --> foo bar
 
print(original) --> foo bar
</source>
 
 
The above function will potentially return a list peppered with empty strings if the original input string has leading, trailing or repeated delimiters.  The following function is an alternative which will return a more compact table with these empty strings omitted.  Due to these omissions, you won't be able to use table.concat to reverse the results back into the original string if it had extra delimiters.
 
 
<source lang="lua">
 
function string.explode2(s, d)
 
  local t = {}
 
    repeat
 
      local pos1, pos2 = string.find(s, d)
 
      t[#t + 1] = string.sub(s, 1, pos1 - 1)
 
      s = string.sub(s, pos2 + 1)
 
    until pos1 == nil
 
    if #s ~= 0 then t[#t + 1] = s end
 
  return t
 
end
 
 
</source>
 
</source>
 
[[Category:Snippets]]
 
[[Category:Snippets]]
 +
{{#set:LOVE Version=any}}
 +
{{#set:Description=Add the ability to explode strings. (return them as a table along defined divider substrings)}}

Latest revision as of 19:11, 11 November 2016

This function adds the ability to explode strings in Lua.

function string.explode(str, div)
    assert(type(str) == "string" and type(div) == "string", "invalid arguments")
    local o = {}
    while true do
        local pos1,pos2 = str:find(div)
        if not pos1 then
            o[#o+1] = str
            break
        end
        o[#o+1],str = str:sub(1,pos1-1),str:sub(pos2+1)
    end
    return o
end

Have an example:

tbl = string.explode("foo bar", " ")
print(tbl[1]) --> foo
-- since we added explode to the string table, we can also do this:
str = "foo bar"
tbl2 = str:explode(" ")
print(tbl2[2]) --> bar
-- to restore the original string, we can use Lua's table.concat:
original = table.concat(tbl, " ")
print(original) --> foo bar