Isolate a pattern using RegEx match

Question

I have a string of the form

 _statistics = 
      [
    { Some JSON text here },
.
.
.
];

Basically, I need the text within '[' and '];' . How can i isolate this using RegEx match.

[Use a parser](http://stackoverflow.com/a/22773121/21475)! :-) — Cameron, Apr 17 '14 at 21:33
So...I presume "Some JSON text here" would be JSON? As in, the potential for `{ "foo": [ 1, [ "a" ]] }`? I believe recursion like that will get in the way of regex. — Kirk Woll, Apr 17 '14 at 21:33
yes.. the JSON text spills over several lines.. but irrespective of what text is between '[' and '];', i need to get it — mhn, Apr 17 '14 at 21:36
[`(?<=\[)[^\]]+(?=\])`](http://regex101.com/r/bL1rO5) works, but will fail if you have something like: `[ { "string" : "[I'm in a bracket]" } ]`. — Sam, Apr 17 '14 at 21:37
@Sam looks like it gives a positive match.. but in C#, i'm not able to isolate the text.. anyways, should solve my real problem:) pls Answer the question so I can mark it as answer — mhn, Apr 17 '14 at 21:46

score 0 · Accepted Answer · answered Apr 17 '14 at 22:02

This isn't really the best solution, but anything more intensive and you might as well be using a full JSON parsing library.

(?<=\[)[^\]]+(?=\])

This looks behind for an open bracket ((?<=\[)), then matches 1+ non bracket characters ([^\]]+), and looks ahead for the closing bracket (?=\]). You could optionally forget the lookarounds, and use a capture group instead:

\[([^\]]+)\]

The reason this isn't the best solution, is because it literally looks for text between [ and ]. So JSON like [ { "string" : "[I'm in a bracket]" } ] would return { "string" : "[I'm in a bracket as a match.

Example: Regex101

Isolate a pattern using RegEx match

1 Answers1