create an array of words (Strings) from String

Question

How do I create an array of strings from a string, eg.

"hello world" would return ["hello", "world"]. This would need to take into account punctuation marks, etc.

There's probably a great RegEx solution for this, I'm just not capable of finding it.

Solution 1

Think I've cracked it, here is the function in full:

public static function getArrayFromString(str:String):Array {
        return str.split(/\W | ' | /gi);
    }

Basically, it uses the 'not a word' condition but excludes apostrophes, is global and ignores case. Thanks to everyone who pointed me in the right direction.

Solution 2

How about AS3's String.split?

var text:String = "hello world";
var split:Array = text.split(" "); // this will give you ["hello", "world"]
// then iterate and strip out any redundant punctuation like commas, colons and full stops

Solution 3

Here's what you need. Tested and working:

private function splitString(str:String):Array {
    var r:RegExp = /\W+/g;
    return str.split(r));
}

http://snipplr.com/view/63811/split-string-into-array/

Solution 4

Any reason that:

var myString:String = "hello world";

var reg:RegExp = /\W/i;

var stringAsArray:Array = myString.replace(reg, "").split(" ");

Won't work?

Solution 5

Maybe this one works too...

public static function getArrayFromString(str:String):Array {
    return str.split(/[^,\.\s\n\r\f¿\?¡!]+/gi);
    }

That should work in languages other than English, for example (i.e. '\w' won't accept accented characters, for instance...)

View more solutions

Comments

[hamishtaplin]

That's completely unhelpful, thanks.

[hamishtaplin]

It's the stripping out the punctuation I'm interested in. I know how to do this with a rather clunky if/else - I'm looking for a more elegant solution though (enter RegExp..)

[James Fassett]

As I said you need to provide a complete input and output specification. I can't keep guessing what you believe does and doesn't constitute a word.

[hamishtaplin]

It's pretty obvious what does and doesn't constitute a word, no guessing required. Thanks for the help though.

[James Fassett]

Not as obvious as you think. You need an apostrophe now. How about hyphenated words? Do you consider currency ($100) a word? Your regular expression will become your specification.

[Danyal Aytekin]

It's good you have something you are happy with. Like a newborn child, take a photo of this, because I think it is the last time you will see it so small. Other unwanted characters are on their way, such as the other species of apostrophe. Feel free to post the regex back here for interest's sake if it becomes particularly frightening...

[hamishtaplin]

You are right of course, thanks for pointing that out. For now, I don't think that'll be a problem though, hopefully.

[hamishtaplin]

Thanks, I will try that out, too.