Re: String Manipulation

.NET Development

11/08/2012
06:09:45 AM
3N10D7IFJ

From:	Gregory
To:	Craig Tucker

Craig,

RegExes work. Try this. Whether it is any better, I don't know

class RegexTest
	{publicstaticvoid Main()
		{string[] tests = {
								@"XYZ Company [- Phone: [({404}) ]{321-4321} [Ext: {6789}]]",
								@"XYZ Company [- Phone: [({404}) ]{321-4321} [Ext: {}]]",
								@"XYZ Company [- Phone: [({}) ]{321-4321} [Ext: {}]]",
								@"XYZ Company [- Phone: [({}) ]{6} [Ext: {}]]"
							 };foreach (string s in tests)
			{string newValue = StoryManipulation(s);
				Console.WriteLine("{0}\n{1}\n", s, newValue);


			}
			Console.ReadLine();
		}
		privatestaticstring StoryManipulation(string theStory)
		{string item = @"(?<Item>\[[^[{]*[{]VariablePattern[}][^]]*\])";string variablePattern = @"(?<VariableContents>[^}]*)";string pattern = item.Replace("VariablePattern", variablePattern);
			MatchCollection matches;while ((matches = Regex.Matches(theStory, pattern, RegexOptions.Singleline)).Count > 0)
			{
				Match match = matches[matches.Count -1];string s = match.Groups["Item"].ToString();if (match.Groups["VariableContents"].Length == 0)
				{// replace [ ...] with ''
					theStory = theStory.Remove(match.Groups["Item"].Index, match.Groups["Item"].Length);
				}else
				{// remove [ ] { and } to avoid subsequent match
					theStory = theStory.Remove(match.Groups["Item"].Index + match.Groups["Item"].Length - 1, 1) // ]
						.Remove(match.Groups["VariableContents"].Index + match.Groups["VariableContents"].Length, 1)	// }
						.Remove(match.Groups["VariableContents"].Index - 1, 1)	// {
						.Remove(match.Groups["Item"].Index , 1)	// [
						;


	
				}
			}


			return theStory;
		}

	}

Hi Everyone,
This was presented to me by one of our graphic guys. I thought I'd post it to you guru's to play with too...
I suspect this would be better written using Regular Expressions but am not that proficient with them yet. Thoughts?
Thanks much, Craig

Given the string "story" below, write a script to do the following.
1. Variable text is enclosed by { }.
2. If the variable text is blank, remove any other text enclosed in [ ].
3. Text to be removed can be nested deep with [ ].

"XYZ Company [- Phone: [({404}) ]{321-4321} [Ext: {6789}]]"

Examples.
1. All variable text filled in.
XYZ Company - Phone: (404) 321-4321 Ext: 6789
2. No Extension entered, remove "Ext:".
XYZ Company - Phone: (404) 321-4321
3. No Extension and no area code entered, remove "Ext:" and "( ) ".
XYZ Company - Phone: 321-4321
4. No extension, no phone number, and no area code entered, remove "Ext:" and "( ) " and "- Phone: ".
XYZ Company

privatestring StoryManipulation(string theStory)
        {// Loop through story while there are still curly bracketswhile (theStory.IndexOf("{") > 0)
            {// Extract the first curly text areastring lcCurlyText = StringUtils.ExtractString(theStory, "{", "}");                // Look for surrounding brackets and blank all text betweenif (String.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(lcCurlyText))
                {for (int lnCounter = theStory.IndexOf("{"); lnCounter >= 0; lnCounter--)
                    {if (theStory.Substring(lnCounter - 1, 1) == "[")
                        {string lcSquareText = StringUtils.ExtractString(theStory.Substring(lnCounter - 1), "[", "]");
                            theStory = StringUtils.ReplaceString(theStory, ("[" + lcSquareText + "]"), "", false);break;
                        }
                    }
                }else
                {// Replace current curly brackets surrounding the text
                    theStory = StringUtils.ReplaceString(theStory, ("{" + lcCurlyText + "}"), lcCurlyText, false);
                }
            }// Replace all brackets with blank (-1 all instances)
            theStory = StringUtils.ReplaceStringInstance(theStory, "[", "", -1, false);
            theStory = StringUtils.ReplaceStringInstance(theStory, "]", "", -1, false);return theStory.Trim();
        }