CODEWITHSUNDEEP
vb.netvisual-studio-2012
elmonko
elmonko

Reputation: 685

Splitting text string at specific points

I have a treeview where the tree nodes are generated from text in text files. The standard layout would be:-

jobname - jobnumber - jobtype (with the spaces in between the " - ")

For part of an operation I need to split this string into the 3 sections, for this I'm using LastIndexOf("-"c) and using the `Microsoft.VisualBasic.Mid' function to split it out

Private Sub Job_Select_Load(sender As Object, e As EventArgs) Handles MyBase.Load
 tbJobName.Text = Main.tvProgress.SelectedNode.Text

    Dim enUK As New CultureInfo("en-GB")
    Dim ToCheck As String = tbJobName.Text
    Dim index1 As Integer = ToCheck.LastIndexOf("-"c)
    Dim jCode As String = Microsoft.VisualBasic.Trim(Microsoft.VisualBasic.Mid(ToCheck, index1 - 5, 5))
    Dim jOps As String = Microsoft.VisualBasic.Trim(Microsoft.VisualBasic.Mid(ToCheck, index1, 10))

The problem i have is when jobtype also contains a '-' in the text as this then throws everything out. I've tried switching it around using IndexOf however occasionally the jobname will contain a '-'

I have no control over the text in jobname - jobnumber - jobtype

Any ideas on how to get round this

If you need any more info then I can update the post....

Upvotes: 0

Views: 77

Answers (4)

ChrisG
ChrisG

Reputation: 1403

I'm assuming you don't have any control over how these files are formatted, because if you did, it would be much better to just change the file format to XML, or at least a CSV file format.

If there are an indefinite number of dashes in both the job name and type, then as long as the number is constant, you can use a Regular Expression to find the groups. It would look like this:

    Dim name, number, type As String
    Dim fileLine As String = "job - name - 1234 - job - type"

    Dim regExp As New Regex("(?<name>.*)\s-\s(?<number>\d+)\s-\s(?<type>.*)")
    Dim m As Match = regExp.Match(fileLine)

    name = m.Groups("name").Value
    number = m.Groups("number").Value
    type = m.Groups("type").Value

Note: this only works if the "job number" is always a number. If not, you might be able to use a more complex regex to match it though.

Upvotes: 1

Andrew Morton
Andrew Morton

Reputation: 25023

If the separator between sections is space-dash-space then you can use the overload of String.Split which determines the maximum number of parts to split it in to:

Dim s = "job-name - jobnumber - jobtype (with the spaces in between the "" - "")"
Dim parts As String() = s.Split(New String() {" - "}, 3, StringSplitOptions.None)
Console.WriteLine("name: " & parts(0).Trim())
Console.WriteLine("number: " & parts(1).Trim())
Console.WriteLine("type: " & parts(2).Trim())

Outputs:

name: job-name
number: jobnumber
type: jobtype (with the spaces in between the " - ")

Upvotes: 0

Justin Ryan
Justin Ryan

Reputation: 1404

Could you not use Dim job As String() = Split(ToCheck, " - ")? Note the spaces around the dash.

Split

Upvotes: 0

competent_tech
competent_tech

Reputation: 44941

If jobname and jobnumber will never contain dashes, then you can just use cascading IndexOfs, with the last found position as the start of the next one.

Dim endOfJobName As Integer = ToCheck.IndexOf("-"c)
If endOfJobName <> - 1 Then
  ' Get jobname here if needed
  Dim endOfJobNumber As Integer = ToCheck.IndexOf(endOfJobName, "-"c)
  If endOfJobNumber <> -1 Then
     ' Get jobnumber here if needed

     ' The remainder of the string is jobtype
     Dim jobType = ToCheck.SubString(endOfJobNumber + 1)
  End If

End If

If either jobname or jobnumber can contain dashes, however, there is not a tremendous amount that can be done, other than changing the delimiter in the source.

Upvotes: 0

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