From: Minero Aoki <aamine@...>
Date: 2004-02-16T02:28:18+09:00
Subject: Re: hyperlinking URLs (and emails?) in text

Hi,

  In mail "hyperlinking URLs (and emails?) in text"
    Ruby Baby <ruby@hitmedia.com> wrote:

> Anyone got a better version, or care to improve on this one?
> 
> Just trying to hyperlink URLs in text (and in future, email addresses, without needing mailto:).

If you have ruby 1.8.1:

  require 'uri'

  text.gsub(URI.regexp(%w(http https ftp))) {|urlstr|
    %Q[<a href="#{urlstr}">#{urlstr}</a>]
  }

Also, you will want to escape '<' '>' '&' in text:

  require 'uri'
  require 'cgi'

  text.gsub(/[<&>"']|#{URI.regexp(%w(http https ftp))}/) {|matched|
    case matched
    when /[<&>"']/
      CGI.escapeHTML(matched)
    else
      url = CGI.escapeHTML(matched)
      %Q[<a href="#{url}">#{url}</a>]
    end
  }


Regards,
Minero Aoki