Java regex replaceAll

Question

I need to remove \s*,\s* but only when it's not between ". For example, this string a, b , c, "a, b , , c," a ,, should look like abc"a, b , , c," a.

As I found out [^abc] means don't touch abc and \.* means everything so I tried this:

str = str.replaceAll("[^\"\\.*,\\.*\"]\\s*,\\s*", "");

Important: amount of " is even.

"\\.* means everything" - It actually will repeat the . character. — August
– August, Commented Dec 20, 2014 at 22:44
Do you mean it gonna work? replaceAll("[^\".*,.*\"]\\s*,\\s*", "") It doesn't. — Maksim
– Maksim, Commented Dec 20, 2014 at 22:49
Not very obvious with regexes; classical tools here would be better (indexOf etc). Also, what must be done if you have, say, a,b, "a, b? — fge
– fge, Commented Dec 20, 2014 at 22:54

alpha bravo · Accepted Answer · 2014-12-20 22:58:06Z

5

Use this pattern

\s*,\s*(?=(?:(?:[^"]*"){2})*[^"]*$)

Demo
and I guess in your case, replace \s with \\s

\s*,\s*                 # your pattern
(?=                     # look-ahead
    (?:(?:[^"]*"){2})*  # optional pairs of double quotes
    [^"]*$              # followed by optional anything but double quotes to the end
)

edited Dec 20, 2014 at 22:58

answered Dec 20, 2014 at 22:52

alpha bravo

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2 Comments

alpha bravo Over a year ago

explanation posted above.

Maksim Over a year ago

Thank you. You've helped me so much. =)

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