Split String by Regex Expression

Question

This is my string.

19282511~2017-08-28 13:24:28~Entering (A/B)~1013~283264/89282511~2017-08-28 13:24:28~Entering (A/B)~1013~283266/79282511~2017-08-28 13:24:28~Entering (A/B)~1013~283261

I would like this string be split like below:

19282511~2017-08-28 13:24:28~Entering (A/B)~1013~283264
89282511~2017-08-28 13:24:28~Entering (A/B)~1013~283266
79282511~2017-08-28 13:24:28~Entering (A/B)~1013~283261

I cannot split my string blindly by slash (/) since there is a value A/B will also get split.

Any idea of doing this by regex expression?

Your help will definitely be appreciated.

Wiktor Stribiżew · Accepted Answer · 2017-09-21 09:57:06Z

4

You may split with / that is in between digits:

(?<=\d)/(?=\d)

See the regex demo

Details

(?<=\d) - a positive lookbehind that requires a digit to appear immediately to the left of the current location
/ - a / char
(?=\d) - a positive lookahead that requires a digit to appear immediately to the right of the current location.

Since the \d pattern is inside non-consuming patterns, only / will be removed upon splitting and the digits will remain in the resulting items.

Another idea is to match and capture these strings using

/?([^~]*(?:~[^~]*){3}~\d+)

See this regex demo.

Details

/? - 1 or 0 / chars
([^~]*(?:~[^~]*){3}~\d+) - Group 1 (what you need to grab):
- [^~]* - zero or more chars other than ~
- (?:~[^~]*){3} - 3 or more sequences of ~ and then 0+ chars other than ~
- ~\d+ - a ~ and then 1 or more digits. The C# code will look like
var results = Regex.Matches(s, @"/?([^~](?:~[^~]){3}~\d+)") .Cast() .Select(m => m.Groups1.Value) .ToList();

NOTE: By default, \d matches all Unicode digits. If you do not want this behavior, use the RegexOptions.ECMAScript option, or replace \d with [0-9] to only match ASCII digits.

edited Sep 21, 2017 at 9:57

answered Sep 21, 2017 at 9:30

Wiktor Stribiżew

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1 Comment

good-to-know Over a year ago

This is beauty of Regex. Thanks much for the quick and wonderful answer. I will accept this as an answer in 7 minutes.

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