Create links out of all URLs in an arbitrary string

Question

Possible Duplicate:
How to replace plain URLs with links?

I am looking to make the user's life a little easier by parsing text input (via javascript) to find all URLs, then link them (wrap tags) so users can just click them. Facebook and even SO does something similar to give you an idea of what I'm looking for.

function censorLinks(text) {
    return text.replace(
        new RegExp('(https?://[^\\s]+)', 'g'),
        '<a href="$1" target="_blank">$1</a>'
    );
}

I don't need to support every protocol. I think http and https is find for now. I'm assuming everything beyond http:// up to the white space is a URL. This almost works but there is one tiny problem: if the URL ends with a period, the period gets included. I suppose it is a valid URL but I think it is unlikely in my situation. How can I prevent the period?

Possible duplicate of the entire related questions section. Look to the bottom right of this page. — Madara's Ghost, Aug 28 '12 at 20:57
It's odd how the related posts are more relevant than what comes up in search. — styfle, Aug 28 '12 at 21:11
@Truth Also those questions don't help me answer what's wrong with my regex. — styfle, Aug 28 '12 at 21:21

score 1 · Accepted Answer · edited Aug 28 '12 at 21:29

1

Like @Truth said, this may be a duplicate post but...

I was recently doing something similar, haven't tested this but maybe this'll wrok...

    var email = /(\w+@[a-zA-Z_]+?\.[a-zA-Z]{2,6})/gim;
    var url = /(\b(https?|ftp|file):\/\/[-A-Z0-9+&@#\/%?=~_|!:,.;]*[-A-Z0-9+&@#\/%=~_|])/ig;

    function convert(input) {
        return input
            .replace(url,'<a href="$1" target="blank">$1</a>')
            .replace(email, '<a href="mailto:$1">$1</a>');
    }

Edit: fixed typo

edited Aug 28 '12 at 21:29

styfle

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answered Aug 28 '12 at 21:00

Nick Briz

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I think `ouput` should be `output`. – styfle Aug 28 '12 at 21:10
I fixed it but your email regex is wrong. Try `first.last@example.com`. – styfle Aug 28 '12 at 21:18
@styfle: If the answer didn't solve your problem, don't accept it as correct. – Madara's Ghost Aug 28 '12 at 21:26
It did solve my problem but his extraneous info was broken. Technically he didn't answer my question though. – styfle Aug 28 '12 at 21:40

Create links out of all URLs in an arbitrary string

1 Answers1