Regular expression and user input string

[barnabas1]

Hello,

What i intend on achieving should be simple if i could just understand regular expressions.

var names=new Array('ben','chris','mary','john');

If a user input string is

var str= "1: said that there are 2 kings in 3:'s house. Tell 4: to come quickly and bring gifts as well."

Using regular expressions, I want to replace the numbers and column combinations with the corresponding name.

so 1: show be replaced with ben, 3: should be replaced with mary.

So new returned string should be

var newStr="ben said there are 2 kings in mary's house. Tell john to come quickly and bring gifts as well."

How do I get to match the number column pattern and get the matched string replaced with names[number].

function (names, str){//function accepts names array and str to replace

//regex matching and replacing

//returning new str

return newStr;
}

any help will be much appreciated.

[Dormilich]

pretty much taken from the MDC page …

function vsprintf(str, arr)
{
    function vprint(match, part)
    {
        // though without type checking ...
        return arr[part - 1];
    }
    // though I'd rather go for %1 than 1:
    return str.replace(/(\d):/g, vprint);
}

[barnabas1]

If the string had a double digit before column eg 11: . The function returned

names[1-1] ; instead of names[11-1]; So code limited to between 1 to 9;

Also if it was a stringwith 10: it would cos an error cos it would try to return names[0-1];

so made some modifications to cater for this situations. also if the array position is undefined, it should return the matched pattern back.

function vsprintf(str, arr)
{
function vprint(match, part)
{
// though without type checking ...
if(part>=1 && part<=arr.length){
//IF part is 0 and not greater than array length,

var h=arr[part - 1];
}

if(!h){//IF h is undefined return the match pattern back
h=part+':'; //just precaution. shouldnt be necessary
}

return h;
}
// though I'd rather go for %1 than 1: (WHAT IS THE REGEX FOR THIS)

return str.replace(/(\d):/g, vprint);
}

var str= "1: said that there are 10 kings in 13:'s house. Tell 4: to come 10: quickly and bring gifts as well."

var names=new Array('ben','chris','mary','john','jane','keisha','ellan','joise','bukky','janet','christopher');

var str2=vsprintf(str, names);

document.write(str2);

printed to screen

"ben said that there are 10 kings in 1mary's house. Tell john to come 10: quickly and bring gifts as well."

Would love it if it could match double digits as well. but i guess this is sufficient thanks.
Actually %1 maybe better. but it should also match %12 (the double digit).

So what is the code for matching %1 and %12 instead.
So matching all digits attached to special character

[Dormilich]

just a matter of adjusting the RegExp: /(\d+):/g

Edit:

// though I'd rather go for %1 than 1: (WHAT IS THE REGEX FOR THIS)

/%(\d+)/g

Originally Posted by barnabas1

so made some modifications to cater for this situations. also if the array position is undefined, it should return the matched pattern back.

               function vprint(match, part)
                {
                    // though without type checking ...
                    if(part>=1 && part<=arr.length){
     //IF part is 0 and not greater than array length, 
                   
                    var h=arr[part - 1];
                    }

                    if(!h){//IF h is undefined return the match pattern back
                        h=part+':'; //just precaution. shouldnt be necessary
                    }

                    return h;
                }

if(!h) will also fire if h is null, 0 or "". better use

function vprint(match, part)
{
    if(part > 0 && part <= arr.length) {
     //IF part is 0 and not greater than array length, 
        return arr[part - 1];
    }
    return match; // preferably return ""; (more consistent with the expectations)
}

[barnabas1]

thanks. I changed my choice to matching %1 instead.
Thanks .
I started a new thread titled url pattern and regex. pls do check it out.