split on string

Question

I have a string like this abc & "def&ghi" & jkl & "mno&pqr" and want to do a split aroung &, but i don't want to split words within double quotes.

Output should be abc, "def&ghi", jkl, "mno&pqr".

I tried doing a split("&") on that string, but that's also splitting the words within double quotes.

Whats the best way of doing this?

Look at the accepted answer [here](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1757065/java-splitting-a-comma-separated-string-but-ignoring-commas-in-quotes), and replace the `,` with a `&` — Perception, Mar 06 '13 at 02:32

score 4 · Accepted Answer · answered Mar 06 '13 at 02:28

It looks like you should use something like a csv parser since those are programmed exactly to handle the issue of " " escaping.

If this is homework and you are not allowed to use production tools, then you should follow the advice in What have you tried?

score 0 · Answer 2 · answered Mar 06 '13 at 02:32

0

if there was a white space between the & quote like you mentioned above

abc & "def&ghi" & jkl & "mno&pqr"

then you can use .split(" & "); to also trim the white space.

answered Mar 06 '13 at 02:32

goravine

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There could be more spaces before and after `&` – Luiggi Mendoza Mar 06 '13 at 02:35
@LuiggiMendoza you're right, but it may be the case that input will always have one space before and after the & – Franklin Mar 06 '13 at 03:15

score 0 · Answer 3 · answered Mar 06 '13 at 04:54

I agree that CSV parser is the solution, but as a matter of principle:

    String s = "abc & \"def&ghi\" & jkl & \"mno&pqr\"";
    String[] a = s.split("(?=.*[^\"] )&");
    System.out.println(Arrays.toString(a));

output

[abc ,  "def, ghi" ,  jkl ,  "mno&pqr"]

split on string

3 Answers3