Get a substring

Question

Hi, I got a string something like "abc-----defg---hi" Any simple way to get the substring "defg"? Note, "---" represents spaces and I don't know the length.

Vulpes · Answer

Unfortunately, it doesn't compile. The first argument has to be either a char or string array if you're using StringSplitOptions. So this works: string defg = s.Split(" ".ToCharArray(), StringSplitOptions.RemoveEmptyEntries)[1]; and so does this: string defg = s.Split(new string[]{" "}, StringSplitOptions.RemoveEmptyEntries)[1]; If you're not using StringSplitOptions, then the first argument has to be a char array but with an important difference - it's a 'params' array. So you can pass a single char such as ' ' or several single chars rather than an array.

Vulpes · Answer

No, it's a char array containing a single space. The idea is that you split the string using a single space as the separator. Where there are multiple spaces adjacent to each other, this will result in empty strings being added to the resulting array. However, by specifying StringSplitOptions.RemoveEmptyEntries, we get rid of these empty strings which just leaves us with 3 strings 'abc', 'defg' and 'hi'. The one we want is the second one which, of course, has an index of 1 in the array.

Vulpes · Answer

If 's' is your string, then this is perhaps the easiest way: string defg = s.Split(new char[]{' '}, StringSplitOptions.RemoveEmptyEntries)[1];

Dave · Answer

Thank you for your helps!!

Dave · Answer

Thank you very much. Why not use string defg = s.Split(" ", StringSplitOptions.RemoveEmptyEntries)[1];

Dave · Answer

Interesting. Can you explain new char[]{' '}? Is this represents spaces in any length?

Vulpes · Answer

Another easy way using regular expressions: using System.Text.RegularExpressions; // ... string defg2 = Regex.Match(s, @"\s+(\S+)\s+").Groups[1].Value;