From: Daniel Sheppard <daniels@...>
Date: 2005-09-28T09:25:25+09:00
Subject: Re: Splitting a string with escapable separator?

Just because you've done something similar before, doesn't mean you
should trust yourself to code it from memory and get it right without
testing....

class String
    def split_escapable(split_char, escape_char)
        arr = []
        split(split_char).each do |x|
            if(arr[-1] && (arr[-1][-1].chr == escape_char))
                arr[-1].chop!
                arr[-1] << x
            else
                arr << x
            end
        end
        arr
    end
end 

It's not very good, because you can't escape the backslash, but some
magic should sort that out, and depending on what you're doing, you
might not care. Also, it's not all that elegant, so maybe you already
got this kind of solution.

Also, you should note that here:

  "Hello\, World,Hi".split_escapable(',' '\')
  # => ["Hello, World", "Hi"]

Since you're using double-quotes, the backslash is already being
consumed as an escape character, and it won't compile because the
backslash in the single quotes needs to be escaped because it preceeds a
single quote. And also because you missed the comma between arguments.

  'Hello\, World,Hi'.split_escapable(',','\\')
  # => ["Hello, World", "Hi"]

works.

#####################################################################################
This email has been scanned by MailMarshal, an email content filter.
#####################################################################################