How to split a String by escaping text which are in double-quotes

Question

I have to split an input comma separated string and store the result in an array.

Following works great

arr=inputString.split(",")

for this example

 John, Doe       =>arr[0]="John"      arr[1]="Doe"

But it fail to get following expected output

"John, Doe", Dan  =>arr[0]="John, Doe" arr[1]="Dan"
 John, "Doe, Dan" =>arr[0]="John"      arr[1]="Doe, Dan"

Following regex too didn't help

        var regExpPatternForDoubleQuotes="\"([^\"]*)\"";
        arr=inputString.match(regExpPatternForDoubleQuotes);
        console.log("txt=>"+arr)

The String could contain more than two double-quotes.

I am trying above in JavaScript.

Thanks for link. Didn't know it was already answered. But the linked answered is very verbose and good one. The answer here is quick and short. I prefer the latter in my case. — Watt, May 20 '13 at 20:58

score 2 · Accepted Answer · answered May 20 '13 at 20:24

This works:

var re = /[ ,]*"([^"]+)"|([^,]+)/g;
var match;
var str = 'John, "Doe, Dan"';
while (match = re.exec(str)) {
    console.log(match[1] || match[2]);
}

How it works:

/
    [ ,]*     # The regex first skips whitespaces and commas
    "([^"]+)" # Then tries to match a double-quoted string
    |([^,]+)  # Then a non quoted string
/g            # With the "g" flag, re.exec will start matching where it has
              # stopped last time

Try here: http://jsfiddle.net/Q5wvY/1/

score 0 · Answer 2 · answered May 20 '13 at 20:23

0

Try to use this pattern with the exec method:

/(?:"[^"]*"|[^,]+)+/g

answered May 20 '13 at 20:23

Casimir et Hippolyte

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How to split a String by escaping text which are in double-quotes

2 Answers2