Removing duplicate spaces from input

Question

<textarea id="check" cols="50" rows="20"></textarea>

<script>
var text = document.getElementById("check").value;
var lengthA = text;

    for (var i = 0; i < lengthA.length; i++) {
var space = " ";
if (lengthA[i] === space) {
    var next = lengthA[i] + 1;
    if (next === space) {
        lengthA.replace(lengthA[i], "");
       }
      }
     }

var length3 = lengthA.length - length2;
var words = length3 + 1;
</script>

Alright bois, me got a problemo! Im attempting to make a word counter through the law that each space equals a word (1:1). Im not sure why it is not working, it makes sense to me in my mind. I have attempted several alternatives and dwelled hours upon trying to fix this chunk. Thank you in advance to anyone that answers, even if it doesn't work! :)

EDIT: Regular expressions did the trick and replaced the incorrectly used for loop and if statements. Thanks

Since you already use the `replace` function in your solution, have you taken a look at this yet - https://stackoverflow.com/questions/1981349/regex-to-replace-multiple-spaces-with-a-single-space — BatScream, Jun 19 '18 at 03:57

Sudipta Mondal · Accepted Answer · 2018-06-19T04:04:04.647

1

How about just the below -

var text = document.getElementById("check").value.replace (/ +/g, " ");

Not sure, why you would need a for loop to begin with.

/ +/ will more than 1 space g will do all the changes throughout the text

edited Jun 19 '18 at 04:04

answered Jun 19 '18 at 03:58

Sudipta Mondal

2,550
1
19
20

score 1 · Answer 2 · answered Jun 19 '18 at 04:03

1

To remove the duplicate space, the following code

lengthA.replace(lengthA[i], "");

should be

lengthA = lengthA.substring(0, i) + lengthA.substring(i + 1);
// i should not increase
i--;
continue;

You misunderstand the usage of replace.

answered Jun 19 '18 at 04:03

Terry Wei

1,521
8
16

Vikasdeep Singh · Answer 3 · 2018-06-19T04:31:50.103

Use str.replace() of JavaScript to do this. This will remove not only space but also work for tabs, newlines etc.

Usage:

var string = string.replace(/\s\s+/g, ' ');

So change below code:

var lengthA = text;

    for (var i = 0; i < lengthA.length; i++) {
var space = " ";
if (lengthA[i] === space) {
    var next = lengthA[i] + 1;
    if (next === space) {
        lengthA.replace(lengthA[i], "");
       }
      }
     }

To this:

var lengthA = text.replace(/\s\s+/g, ' ');

Reference here : https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/String/replace

Removing duplicate spaces from input

3 Answers3