I have to cut the price from strings like that:
s1 = "somefing $ 100"
s2 = "$ 19081 words $"
s3 = "30$"
s4 = "hi $90"
s5 = "wow 150"
Output should be:
s1 = "100"
s2 = "19081"
s3 = "30"
s4 = "90"
s5 = nil
I use the following regex:
price = str[/\$\s*(\d+)|(\d+)\s*\$/, 1]
But it doesn't work for all types of strings.
Your code always returns the result of the first capture group group whereas in the failing case it is the second capture group that you are interested in. I don't think the [] method has a good way of dealing with this (when using numbered capture groups). You could write this like so
price = str =~ /\$\s*(\d+)|(\d+)\s*\$/ && ($1 || $2)
Although this isn't very legible. If instead you use a named capture group, then you can do
price = str[/\$\s*(?<amount>\d+)|(?<amount>\d+)\s*\$/, 'amount']
Duplicate named capture groups won't always do what you want but when they are in separate alternation branches (as they are here) then it should work.
The problem is that you're always getting value from the first regex group and you don't check the second. So, you're not looking the case after | - the one when digit is before $ sign.
If you look at the graphical representation of your regex, by typing 1 as a second parameter in square brackets, you are covering only the upper path (first case), and you never check lower one (second case).
Basically, try:
price = str[/\$\s*(\d+)|(\d+)\s*\$/, 1] or str[/\$\s*(\d+)|(\d+)\s*\$/, 2]
P.S. I'm not that experienced in Ruby, there might be some more optimal way to type this, but this should do the trick
try this, its much simpler but it may not be the most efficient.
p1 = s1.gsub(' ','')[/\$(\d+)|(\d+)\$/,1]
