Can I replace groups in Java regex?

user_89534 0
Viewed 151646

I have this code, and I want to know, if I can replace only groups (not all pattern) in Java regex. Code:

 //...
 Pattern p = Pattern.compile("(\\d).*(\\d)");
    String input = "6 example input 4";
    Matcher m = p.matcher(input);
    if (m.find()) {

        //Now I want replace group one ( (\\d) ) with number 
       //and group two (too (\\d) ) with 1, but I don't know how.

    }
regex-group replace regex java
6 Answers

Use $n (where n is a digit) to refer to captured subsequences in replaceFirst(...). I'm assuming you wanted to replace the first group with the literal string "number" and the second group with the value of the first group.

Pattern p = Pattern.compile("(\\d)(.*)(\\d)");
String input = "6 example input 4";
Matcher m = p.matcher(input);
if (m.find()) {
    // replace first number with "number" and second number with the first
    String output = m.replaceFirst("number $3$1");  // number 46
}

Consider (\D+) for the second group instead of (.*). * is a greedy matcher, and will at first consume the last digit. The matcher will then have to backtrack when it realizes the final (\d) has nothing to match, before it can match to the final digit.

user_807140

replace the password fields from the input:

{"_csrf":["9d90c85f-ac73-4b15-ad08-ebaa3fa4a005"],"originPassword":["uaas"],"newPassword":["uaas"],"confirmPassword":["uaas"]}



  private static final Pattern PATTERN = Pattern.compile(".*?password.*?\":\\[\"(.*?)\"\\](,\"|}$)", Pattern.CASE_INSENSITIVE);

  private static String replacePassword(String input, String replacement) {
    Matcher m = PATTERN.matcher(input);
    StringBuffer sb = new StringBuffer();
    while (m.find()) {
      Matcher m2 = PATTERN.matcher(m.group(0));
      if (m2.find()) {
        StringBuilder stringBuilder = new StringBuilder(m2.group(0));
        String result = stringBuilder.replace(m2.start(1), m2.end(1), replacement).toString();
        m.appendReplacement(sb, result);
      }
    }
    m.appendTail(sb);
    return sb.toString();
  }

  @Test
  public void test1() {
    String input = "{\"_csrf\":[\"9d90c85f-ac73-4b15-ad08-ebaa3fa4a005\"],\"originPassword\":[\"123\"],\"newPassword\":[\"456\"],\"confirmPassword\":[\"456\"]}";
    String expected = "{\"_csrf\":[\"9d90c85f-ac73-4b15-ad08-ebaa3fa4a005\"],\"originPassword\":[\"**\"],\"newPassword\":[\"**\"],\"confirmPassword\":[\"**\"]}";
    Assert.assertEquals(expected, replacePassword(input, "**"));
  }
user_22353230

Here is a different solution, that also allows the replacement of a single group in multiple matches. It uses stacks to reverse the execution order, so the string operation can be safely executed.

private static void demo () {

    final String sourceString = "hello world!";

    final String regex = "(hello) (world)(!)";
    final Pattern pattern = Pattern.compile(regex);

    String result = replaceTextOfMatchGroup(sourceString, pattern, 2, world -> world.toUpperCase());
    System.out.println(result);  // output: hello WORLD!
}

public static String replaceTextOfMatchGroup(String sourceString, Pattern pattern, int groupToReplace, Function<String,String> replaceStrategy) {
    Stack<Integer> startPositions = new Stack<>();
    Stack<Integer> endPositions = new Stack<>();
    Matcher matcher = pattern.matcher(sourceString);

    while (matcher.find()) {
        startPositions.push(matcher.start(groupToReplace));
        endPositions.push(matcher.end(groupToReplace));
    }
    StringBuilder sb = new StringBuilder(sourceString);
    while (! startPositions.isEmpty()) {
        int start = startPositions.pop();
        int end = endPositions.pop();
        if (start >= 0 && end >= 0) {
            sb.replace(start, end, replaceStrategy.apply(sourceString.substring(start, end)));
        }
    }
    return sb.toString();       
}
user_45088990
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