ruby regex: match URL recurring pattern

Question

I want to be able to match all the following cases below using Ruby 1.8.7.

/pages/multiedit/16801,16809,16817,16825,16833
/pages/multiedit/16801,16809,16817
/pages/multiedit/16801
/pages/multiedit/1,3,5,7,8,9,10,46

I currently have:

\/pages\/multiedit\/\d*

This matches upto the first set of numbers. So for example:

"/pages/multiedit/16801,16809,16817,16825,16833"[/\/pages\/multiedit\/\d*/]
# => "/pages/multiedit/16801"

See http://rubular.com/r/ruFPx5yIAF for example.

Thanks for the help, regex gods.

rtcherry · Accepted Answer · 2013-05-09 12:09:55Z

2

\/pages\/multiedit\/\d+(?:,\d+)*

Example: http://rubular.com/r/0nhpgki6Gy

Edit: Updated to not capture anything... Although the performance hit would be negligible. (Thanks Tin Man)

The currently accepted answer of

\/pages\/multiedit\/[\d,]+

may not be a good idea because that will also match the following strings

.../pages/multiedit/,,,
.../pages/multiedit/,1,

My answer requires there be at least one digit before the first comma, and at least one digit between commas, and it must end with a digit.

edited May 9, 2013 at 12:09

answered May 9, 2013 at 1:01

rtcherry

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1 Comment

the Tin Man Over a year ago

Be careful using (...) in patterns because they're capturing. Instead you should use (?:...) which is non-capturing.

the Tin Man · Accepted Answer · 2013-05-09 04:03:02Z

1

I'd use:

/\/pages\/multiedit\/[\d,]+/

Here's a demonstration of the pattern at http://rubular.com/r/h7VLZS1W1q

[\d,]+ means "find one or more numbers or commas"

The reason \d* doesn't work is it means "find zero or more numbers". As soon as the pattern search runs into a comma it stops. You have to tell the engine that it's OK to find numbers and commas.

edited May 9, 2013 at 4:03

answered May 9, 2013 at 3:54

the Tin Man

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