How do you get the substring using 2 encapsulating characters?

Question

How do we get a substring from :

NSString *string = @"exmple string [image]";

where we want to extract the string in between "[" and "]".

I was thinking of using NSRange with:

NSRange rangeStart = [title rangeOfString:@"[" options:NSLiteralSearch];
NSRange rangeEnd = [title rangeOfString:@"]" options:NSLiteralSearch];

But i can't seem to find a solution on this.

That's the right start. Use the result of the two ranges to get the substring. — rmaddy, Mar 06 '14 at 22:44

score 1 · Accepted Answer · answered Mar 06 '14 at 22:48

Variant 1:

NSRange rangeStart = [title rangeOfString:@"[" options:NSLiteralSearch];
NSRange rangeEnd = [title rangeOfString:@"]" options:NSLiteralSearch];
substring = [your_string substringWithRange:NSMakeRange(rangeStart.location + 1, rangeEnd.location - rangeStart.location - 1)];

Variant 2:

NSArray *ar = componentsSeparatedByCharactersInSet:[NSCharacterSet characterSetWithCharactersInString:@"[]"];
substring = ar[1];

score 0 · Answer 2 · edited May 23 '17 at 11:49

0

Take a look at NSRegularExpression and this answer will give you the regular expression you want.

edited May 23 '17 at 11:49

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answered Mar 06 '14 at 22:46

brindy

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tiguero · Answer 3 · 2014-03-06T23:15:22.273

Usage fo regular expression (Regex) is the way to go for this type of thing:

NSError* error;
NSRegularExpression *regex = [NSRegularExpression regularExpressionWithPattern:@"\\[(.*?)\\]" options:NSRegularExpressionCaseInsensitive error:&error];

NSString *str = @"example string [image]";
NSRange rangeOfFirstMatch = [regex rangeOfFirstMatchInString:str options:0 range:NSMakeRange(0, [str length])];
NSString *substringForFirstMatch;
if (!NSEqualRanges(rangeOfFirstMatch, NSMakeRange(NSNotFound, 0))) {
        substringForFirstMatch = [str substringWithRange:NSMakeRange(rangeOfFirstMatch.location + 1, rangeOfFirstMatch.length - 2)];
  }

NSLog(@"%@", substringForFirstMatch); // will print image

How do you get the substring using 2 encapsulating characters?

3 Answers3