Regexer

Your regex helper. Makes working with regular expressions in Objective-C short, sweet and performant.

Features

• Implemented as a category on NSString which makes for super-clean regex-using code.
• Regexer caches compiled regexes to prevent unnecessary re-compilation for subsequent uses of the same pattern and options. Use regexes without polluting your classes with regex instantitation and caching logic.
• Uses indexed subscripting to provide succinct access to matches and capture groups (optional).
• Regexes are lazily compiled as needed.
• Regexer is thread-safe.

Basics

You can perform simple match checks super quickly using Regexer:

BOOL match = [@"Hello World!" rx_matchesPattern:@"[a-zA-Z ]+?!"];

If you would rather extract strings than perform a boolean check for matches, you can do that too. When searching for matches using Regexer, you will obtain zero or more RXMatch instances. Each RXMatch represents a single occurrence of the given pattern. An RXMatch exposes its text, range and an array of RXCaptures (which are also accessible through indexed subscripting, i.e. square brackets syntax). The first capture in the array is the whole matched pattern ($0) and the following captures correspond to the pattern's capturing groups ($1, $2, ...). Each capture exposes the captured text and its range in the original string.

Usage

Checking for Matches

If you simply want to know whether a given string matches a pattern, you can do it like so:

BOOL match = [@"Hello World!" rx_matchesPattern:@"[a-zA-Z ]+?!"];
BOOL match = [@"Hello World!" rx_matchesPattern:@"[a-z ]+?!" options:NSRegularExpressionCaseInsensitive];

Extracting Text

You can quickly obtain the strings and ranges of text matched by your pattern:

NSString *someText = @"What is your quest?";
NSString *pattern = @"\\b[a-zA-Z]+?\\b";

NSArray *texts = [someText rx_textsForMatchesWithPattern:pattern];
NSArray *ranges = [someText rx_rangesForMatchesWithPattern:pattern];

If you're interested in both texts and ranges, it is more efficient to benefit from the fact that Regexer also exposes the matched text and range at the RXMatch level. This is equivalent to accessing the first capture ($0) in the match, which always corresponds to the whole matched pattern. This is a great way to work with matches if you don't use capturing groups:

NSArray *matches = [someText rx_matchesWithPattern:pattern];

for (RXMatch *match in matches)
{
	NSLog(@"Text: %@, Range: [location: %d, length: %d]", [match text],
	                                                      [match range].location,
	                                                      [match range].length);
}

Advanced Text Extraction Using Capturing Groups

The following pattern matches words and captures the first letter of each word using a capturing group, in addition to capturing the whole string matched by the pattern ($0). Using indexed subscripting (the square brackets operator), you can quickly extract any required info:

NSArray *matches = [@"To seek the Holy Grail." rx_matchesWithPattern:@"\\b([a-zA-Z])([a-zA-Z]+?)\\b"];

NSString *word1 = [matches[0][0] text]; // @"To" (equivalent to $0 in regex-speak)
NSString *letter1 = [matches[0][1] text]; // @"T" (equivalent to $1 in regex-speak)
NSString *remainder1 = [matches[0][2] text]; // @"o" (equivalent to $2 in regex-speak)
NSRange word1Range = [matches[0][0] range]; // 0..1 (NSRange)

You can also iterate over matches and/or captures as required:

for (RXCapture *capture in [matches[1] captures])
{
	NSLog(@"Text: %@, Range: [location: %d, length: %d]", [capture text],
	                                                      [capture range].location,
	                                                      [capture range].length);
}

Obtaining a Specific Capturing Group Across All Matches

If you are interested in a single capturing group across all matches of your pattern, you can obtain an array of RXCaptures for that group, then extract any required info:

NSArray *captures = [@"To seek the Holy Grail." rx_capturesForGroup:1 withPattern:@"\\b([a-zA-Z])([a-zA-Z]+?)\\b"];
		
NSString *firstLetter1 [captures[0] text] // @"T"
NSString *firstLetter2 [captures[1] text] // @"s"
NSString *firstLetter3 [captures[2] text] // @"t"
NSString *firstLetter4 [captures[3] text] // @"H"
NSString *firstLetter5 [captures[4] text] // @"G"

Obtaining the Texts for a Capturing Group Across All Matches

... or if you're only interested in the text of those captures, you can ask for it directly:

NSArray *texts = [@"To seek the Holy Grail." rx_textsForGroup:1 withPattern:@"\\b([a-zA-Z])([a-zA-Z]+?)\\b"];
// texts == @[@"T", @"s", @"t", @"H", @"G"]

Obtaining the Ranges for a Capturing Group Across All Matches

... same goes for ranges:

NSArray *ranges = [@"To seek the Holy Grail." rx_rangesForGroup:1 withPattern:@"\\b([a-zA-Z])([a-zA-Z]+?)\\b"];
// ranges == 0..1, 3..6, ... (NSRange's boxed in NSValue instances)

Working With Matches and Captures Directly

If you prefer being more explicit and avoid indexed subscripting, you can also manipulate RXMatch and RXCapture instances directly:

NSArray *matches = [@"To seek the Holy Grail." rx_matchesWithPattern:@"\\b([a-zA-Z])([a-zA-Z]+?)\\b"];

RXMatch *match = [matches firstObject];
RXCapture *capture = [[match captures] objectAtIndex:0]; // Or: match[0]
NSString *text = [capture text];
NSRange range = [capture range];

Obtaining Cached NSRegularExpression Instances

If you simply want a pre-compiled, cached NSRegularExpression instance to perform some more advanced regex operations that may not be covered by Regexer's API, you can obtain one like this:

NSRegularExpression *regex = [@"[a-zA-Z0-9]{10}" rx_regex];
NSRegularExpression *regexWithOptions = [@"[a-zA-Z0-9]{10}" rx_regexWithOptions:NSRegularExpressionCaseInsensitive];

Replacements

Performing regex-based replacement using Regexer is easy:

NSString *altered = [@"What is your quest?" rx_stringByReplacingMatchesOfPattern:@"\\b([a-zA-Z]+?)\\b" withTemplate:@"$1-hello"];
// Result: @"What-hello is-hello your-hello quest-hello?"

Implementation Details

• Regexer indexes cached compiled regexes by their pattern and options, so rest assured that multiple regexes with the same pattern but with different options will not clash.

Installation

Regexer is available through CocoaPods, to install it simply add the following line to your Podfile:

pod "Regexer"

Author

Michaël Fortin (fortinmike@irradiated.net)

License

Regexer is available under the MIT license. See the LICENSE file for more info.