Split a string using String.split()Tag(s): String/Number

http://www.rgagnon.com/javadetails/java-0438.html

The String class has a split() (since 1.4) method that will return a String array.

public class StringSplit {
  public static void main(String args[]) throws Exception{
    String testString = "Real-How-To";
    System.out.println
      (java.util.Arrays.toString(testString.split("-")));
    // output : [Real, How, To]
  }
}

split() is based on regex expression, a special attention is neededwith some characters which have a special meaning in a regex expression.

For example :

public class StringSplit {
  public static void main(String args[]) throws Exception{
    String testString = "Real.How.To";
    // bad
    System.out.println
       (java.util.Arrays.toString(testString.split(".")));
    // output : []

    // good
    System.out.println
       (java.util.Arrays.toString(testString.split("\\.")));
    // output : [Real, How, To]
  }
}

And

public class StringSplit {
  public static void main(String args[]) throws Exception{
    String testString = "Real|How|To";
    // bad
    System.out.println
       (java.util.Arrays.toString(testString.split("|")));
    // output : [, R, e, a, l, |, H, o, w, |, T, o]

    // good
    System.out.println
       (java.util.Arrays.toString(testString.split("\\|")));
    // output : [Real, How, To]
  }
}

The special character needs to be escaped with a "\" but since "\"is also a special character in Java, you need to escape it again with another "\" !

---

Consider this example

public class StringSplit {
  public static void main(String args[]) throws Exception{
    String testString = "Real|How|To|||";
    System.out.println
       (java.util.Arrays.toString(testString.split("\\|")));
    // output : [Real, How, To]
  }
}

The result does not include the empty strings between the "|" separator.To keep the empty strings :

public class StringSplit {
  public static void main(String args[]) throws Exception{
    String testString = "Real|How|To|||";
    System.out.println
       (java.util.Arrays.toString(testString.split("\\|", -1)));
    // output : [Real, How, To, , , ]
  }
}

See split(String.int).

---

String.split() is only available since JDK 1.4.

With previous version, java.util.StringTokeniser can be used.

See this HowTo

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Some notes from A. Gonzales about String.split()

Special cases using String.split():

public class StringSplit {
  public static void main(String args[]) throws Exception{
    System.out.println
       (java.util.Arrays.toString("  s".split(" ")));
    // output : [, , s]

    System.out.println
       (java.util.Arrays.toString("".split("")));
    // output : []

    System.out.println
       (java.util.Arrays.toString("  ".split(" ")));
    // output : []

    System.out.println
       (java.util.Arrays.toString("      ".split(" ")));
    // output : []

    System.out.println
       (java.util.Arrays.toString(" s ".split(" ")));
    // output : [, s]
  }
}

---

It's important to note that an invocation like:

param = req.getParam(...);
String[] words = param.split(" ");
String firstWord = words[0];

will generate a NullPointerException if param.equals(" ").

---

Using split() with a space can be a problem. Consider the following :

public class StringSplit {
  public static void main(String args[]) throws Exception{
    String testString = "Real  How To";  // extra space

    System.out.println
       (java.util.Arrays.toString(testString.split(" ")));
    // output : [Real, , How, To]
  }
}

We have an extra element.The fix is to specify a regular expression to match one or more spaces.

public class StringSplit {
  public static void main(String args[]) throws Exception{
    String testString = "Real  How To";

    System.out.println
       (java.util.Arrays.toString(testString.split("\\s+")));
    // output : [Real, How, To]
  }
}

---

Since String.split() is based on regular expression, you can make some complex operations with a simple call!

  String testString = "{RealHowto}{java-0438.html}{usage of String.split()}";
  System.out.println
     (java.util.Arrays.toString(testString.split("[{}]")));
  // output : [, RealHowto, , java-0438.html, , usage of String.split()]
  // note : extra empty elements :-(

---

To split a long string into into fixed-length parts. In this example, we split in groups of 3 characters :

  String testString = "012345678901234567890";
  System.out.println
     (java.util.Arrays.toString(testString.split("(?<=\\G.{3})")));
  // output : [012, 345, 678, 901, 234, 567, 890]

---

To split but keep the separator :

   String testString = "RealHowto!java-0438.html!usage of String.split()!";
   System.out.println
      (java.util.Arrays.toString(testString.split("(?<=[!])")));
   // output : [RealHowto!, java-0438.html!, usage of String.split()!]