Java: Splitting a string by whitespace when there is a variable number of whitespaces between words?

Question

I have the following:

String string = "1-50  of 500+";
String[] stringArray = string.split(" ");

Printing out all the elements in this array gives me the following:

Element 1: 1-50
Element 2:  of 500+

How can I get it to split elements by the requirement that there is at least one whitespace between the words?

In other words, I want my elements to be:

Element 1: 1-50
Element 2: of
Element 3: 500+

Solution 1

Use \\s+ to split on spaces even if they are more.

String string = "1-50  of 500+";
String[] stringArray = string.split("\\s+");

for (String str : stringArray)
{
    System.out.println(str);
}

Full example: http://ideone.com/CFVr6N

EDIT:

If you also want to split on tabs, change the regex to \\s+|\\t+ and it detects both spaces and tabs as well.

Solution 2

You can split using regex

string.split("\\s+");

Solution 3

import java.util.*;
import java.lang.*;
import java.io.*;

/* Name of the class has to be "Main" only if the class is public. */
class Ideone
{
public static void main (String[] args) throws java.lang.Exception
{
    String string = "1-50  of 500+";
    String[] stringArray = string.split("\\s+");
    for (String str : stringArray)
      {
        System.out.println(str);
      }
   }
}

Solution 4

Use this to spilt the String.

String[] stringArray = string.split("\\s+");

Solution 5

Your Program is correct but you put two space after 1-50. So Its giving you that output. Remove one space and you are done. No need to change the code. But if there is a two space then you should use string.split("\\s+")

View more solutions

Comments

[Admin]

I might add I am retrieving the data from an HTML page... so maybe that space that I am seeing in the output is actually some other sort of whitespace?

[Vimal Bera]

try to use String#trim() function on every string from an array.

[Pshemo]

Tab is considered whitespace so it belongs to \s class. There is no need to add special case for it.