String.replaceAll to refer replace content

[Sharon whipple]

I would like to replace all numbers in a string to new lines according to the number

For example:
String a = " this 2 is 4 my 3 string";
Output will be "
String a = " this \n\n is \n\n\n\n my \n\n\n string";

Is it possible to do that using string.replaceAll or i need to tokenize the string build a new one?

Thank you

[Raza Mohd]

Hi sharon..

Of course it is possible to replace all numbers to new Line .
ReplaceAll takes Regex patter and the new String for replacement.

It can be like that..

String a = " this 2 is 4 my 3 string"; 
a.replaceAll("[0-9]","\n");

Regards.
Raza.

[Sharon whipple]

Hi Raza,

I think i didn't explain correctly
The replacement should plant new lines according to the content being replaced

For example:
If it finds 2 - > replace it with 2 new lines (\n\n)
If it finds 10 - > replace it with 10 new lines (\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n)

[Raza Mohd]

oops i did not anticipated correctly.

I dont think that replaceAll method will allow to do that.You will have to use StringTokenizer for that.

Regards.
Raza

[Rob Spoor]

Don't use StringTokenizer - use Pattern and Matcher. In pseudo code:

Pattern pattern = Pattern.compile("\\d+");
Matcher matcher = pattern.matcher(input);
StringBuffer sb = new StringBuffer();
while (matcher.find())
{
    int num = get int from matcher;
    String enters = "\n" * num;
    matcher.appendReplacement(sb, enters);
}
matcher.appendTail(sb);
String output = sb.toString();

[Sharon whipple]

Thank you its working great.

			
                                String originalText = " this 2 is 4 my 3 string"; 
                                StringBuffer newText = new StringBuffer();
                                Pattern myPattern = Pattern.compile("[0-9]+");
				Matcher myMatcher = myPattern.matcher(originalText);
				while (myMatcher.find()) {			
				    tempBuff = new StringBuffer();
					String toReplace = myMatcher.group();
					Integer iter =  Integer.parseInt(toReplace);
					for(int i=0;i<iter;i++) {
                                                  tempBuf.append('\n');
                                        }
					}
	
				    myMatcher.appendReplacement(newText, tempBuff.toString());
				}
				myMatcher.appendTail(newText);

>

[Campbell Ritchie]

Well done