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Regular Expression to match compound words using only the first word

I am trying to create a regular expression in JS which will match the occurences of box and return the full compound word
Using the string:
the box which is contained within a box-wrap has a box-button
I would like to get:
[box, box-wrap, box-button]
Is this possible to match these words only using the string box?
This is what I have tried so far but it does not return the results I desire.
http://jsfiddle.net/w860xdme/
var str ='the box which is contained within a box-wrap has a box-button';
var regex = new RegExp('([\w-]*box[\w-]*)', 'g');
document.getElementById('output').innerHTML=str.match(regex);

Try this way:
([\w-]*box[\w-]*)
Regex live here.
Requested by comments, here is a working example in javascript:
function my_search(word, sentence) {
var pattern = new RegExp("([\\w-]*" + word + "[\\w-]*)", "gi");
sentence.replace(pattern, function(match) {
document.write(match + "<br>"); // here you can do what do you want
return match;
});
};
var phrase = "the box which is contained within a box-wrap " +
"has a box-button. it is inbox...";
my_search("box", phrase);
Hope it helps.

I'll just throw this out there:
(box[\w-]*)+

You can use this regex in JS:
var w = "box"
var re = new RegExp("\\b" + w + "\\S*");
RegEx Demo

This should work, note the 'W' is upper case.
http://www.w3schools.com/jsref/jsref_obj_regexp.asp
\Wbox\W

It looks like you're wanting to use the match with a regex. Match is a string method that will take a regex as an argument and return an array containing matches.
var str = "your string that contains all of the words you're looking for";
var regex = /you(\S)*(?=\s)/g;
var returnedArray = str.match(regex);
//console.log(returnedArray) returns ['you', 'you\'re']

jquery/javascript how to get rid of blank spaces (replace() not working)

Hi all,
I have a string coming from my database:
var theString = "LNDSH - LONDON SHOPS";
I need to get two variables out of it.
One with the code before the -, and the other one with the sentence after the -.
To do so I do:
var sentence = $.trim(theString.substring((theString.indexOf('-')+1),theString.length));
var code = $.trim(theString.substring(0, theString.indexOf('-')));
var sentence is ok, but I cannot get rid of the spaces before the - in the code variable.
I really need to get rid of those spaces.
Please note that in var sentence I'm doing +1 because it is always one space in between the sentence and the -.
But in the case of the code: I don't know the length of the code and I don't know how many spaces will be before the -
I've tried:
code.replaceAll("\\s+", " ");
But this does not show a thing in my page (no javascript errors either).
I'm using jquery-1.5.1.min and jquery-ui-1.8.14.custom.min
Thanks a lot!

You may use split with regular expression:
var values = "LNDSH - LONDON SHOPS".split(/\s*-\s*/);
console.log(values[0]); // "LNDSH"
console.log(values[1]); // "LONDON SHOPS"

Try this:
variable.replace(/\s/g,'');
Edit: The above will not seperate your strings, it will only remove the white spaces.
To seperate the strings you can do this:
var seperate = theString.split("-", 2);
var LNDSH = seperate[0];
var LONDON_SHOPS = seperate[1];

var theString = "LNDSH - LONDON SHOPS";
var vett = theString.split("-");
var a = vett[0].trim();
var b = vett[1].trim();

var test = theString.split("-");
alert(test[0].trim());
alert(test[1].trim());

Javascript RegExp match & Multiple backreferences

I'm having trouble trying to use multiple back references in a javascript match so far I've got: -
function newIlluminate() {
var string = "the time is a quarter to two";
var param = "time";
var re = new RegExp("(" + param + ")", "i");
var test = new RegExp("(time)(quarter)(the)", "i");
var matches = string.match(test);
$("#debug").text(matches[1]);
}
newIlluminate();
#Debug when matching the Regex 're' prints 'time' which is the value of param.
I've seen match examples where multiple back references are used by wrapping the match in parenthesis however my match for (time)(quarter)... is returning null.
Where am I going wrong? Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Your regex is literally looking for timequarterthe and splitting the match (if it finds one) into the three backreferences.
I think you mean this:
var test = /time|quarter|the/ig;

Your regex test simply doesn't match the string (as it does not contain the substring timequarterthe). I guess you want alternation:
var test = /time|quarter|the/ig; // does not even need a capturing group
var matches = string.match(test);
$("#debug").text(matches!=null ? matches.join(", ") : "did not match");

Use dynamic (variable) string as regex pattern in JavaScript

I want to add a (variable) tag to values with regex, the pattern works fine with PHP but I have troubles implementing it into JavaScript.
The pattern is (value is the variable):
/(?!(?:[^<]+>|[^>]+<\/a>))\b(value)\b/is
I escaped the backslashes:
var str = $("#div").html();
var regex = "/(?!(?:[^<]+>|[^>]+<\\/a>))\\b(" + value + ")\\b/is";
$("#div").html(str.replace(regex, "" + value + ""));
But this seem not to be right, I logged the pattern and its exactly what it should be.
Any ideas?

To create the regex from a string, you have to use JavaScript's RegExp object.
If you also want to match/replace more than one time, then you must add the g (global match) flag. Here's an example:
var stringToGoIntoTheRegex = "abc";
var regex = new RegExp("#" + stringToGoIntoTheRegex + "#", "g");
// at this point, the line above is the same as: var regex = /#abc#/g;
var input = "Hello this is #abc# some #abc# stuff.";
var output = input.replace(regex, "!!");
alert(output); // Hello this is !! some !! stuff.
JSFiddle demo here.
In the general case, escape the string before using as regex:
Not every string is a valid regex, though: there are some speciall characters, like ( or [. To work around this issue, simply escape the string before turning it into a regex. A utility function for that goes in the sample below:
function escapeRegExp(stringToGoIntoTheRegex) {
return stringToGoIntoTheRegex.replace(/[-\/\\^$*+?.()|[\]{}]/g, '\\$&');
}
var stringToGoIntoTheRegex = escapeRegExp("abc"); // this is the only change from above
var regex = new RegExp("#" + stringToGoIntoTheRegex + "#", "g");
// at this point, the line above is the same as: var regex = /#abc#/g;
var input = "Hello this is #abc# some #abc# stuff.";
var output = input.replace(regex, "!!");
alert(output); // Hello this is !! some !! stuff.
JSFiddle demo here.
Note: the regex in the question uses the s modifier, which didn't exist at the time of the question, but does exist -- a s (dotall) flag/modifier in JavaScript -- today.

If you are trying to use a variable value in the expression, you must use the RegExp "constructor".
var regex = "(?!(?:[^<]+>|[^>]+<\/a>))\b(" + value + ")\b";
new RegExp(regex, "is")

I found I had to double slash the \b to get it working. For example to remove "1x" words from a string using a variable, I needed to use:
str = "1x";
var regex = new RegExp("\\b"+str+"\\b","g"); // same as inv.replace(/\b1x\b/g, "")
inv=inv.replace(regex, "");

You don't need the " to define a regular expression so just:
var regex = /(?!(?:[^<]+>|[^>]+<\/a>))\b(value)\b/is; // this is valid syntax
If value is a variable and you want a dynamic regular expression then you can't use this notation; use the alternative notation.
String.replace also accepts strings as input, so you can do "fox".replace("fox", "bear");
Alternative:
var regex = new RegExp("/(?!(?:[^<]+>|[^>]+<\/a>))\b(value)\b/", "is");
var regex = new RegExp("/(?!(?:[^<]+>|[^>]+<\/a>))\b(" + value + ")\b/", "is");
var regex = new RegExp("/(?!(?:[^<]+>|[^>]+<\/a>))\b(.*?)\b/", "is");
Keep in mind that if value contains regular expressions characters like (, [ and ? you will need to escape them.

I found this thread useful - so I thought I would add the answer to my own problem.
I wanted to edit a database configuration file (datastax cassandra) from a node application in javascript and for one of the settings in the file I needed to match on a string and then replace the line following it.
This was my solution.
dse_cassandra_yaml='/etc/dse/cassandra/cassandra.yaml'
// a) find the searchString and grab all text on the following line to it
// b) replace all next line text with a newString supplied to function
// note - leaves searchString text untouched
function replaceStringNextLine(file, searchString, newString) {
fs.readFile(file, 'utf-8', function(err, data){
if (err) throw err;
// need to use double escape '\\' when putting regex in strings !
var re = "\\s+(\\-\\s(.*)?)(?:\\s|$)";
var myRegExp = new RegExp(searchString + re, "g");
var match = myRegExp.exec(data);
var replaceThis = match[1];
var writeString = data.replace(replaceThis, newString);
fs.writeFile(file, writeString, 'utf-8', function (err) {
if (err) throw err;
console.log(file + ' updated');
});
});
}
searchString = "data_file_directories:"
newString = "- /mnt/cassandra/data"
replaceStringNextLine(dse_cassandra_yaml, searchString, newString );
After running, it will change the existing data directory setting to the new one:
config file before:
data_file_directories:
- /var/lib/cassandra/data
config file after:
data_file_directories:
- /mnt/cassandra/data

Much easier way: use template literals.
var variable = 'foo'
var expression = `.*${variable}.*`
var re = new RegExp(expression, 'g')
re.test('fdjklsffoodjkslfd') // true
re.test('fdjklsfdjkslfd') // false

Using string variable(s) content as part of a more complex composed regex expression (es6|ts)
This example will replace all urls using my-domain.com to my-other-domain (both are variables).
You can do dynamic regexs by combining string values and other regex expressions within a raw string template. Using String.raw will prevent javascript from escaping any character within your string values.
// Strings with some data
const domainStr = 'my-domain.com'
const newDomain = 'my-other-domain.com'
// Make sure your string is regex friendly
// This will replace dots for '\'.
const regexUrl = /\./gm;
const substr = `\\\.`;
const domain = domainStr.replace(regexUrl, substr);
// domain is a regex friendly string: 'my-domain\.com'
console.log('Regex expresion for domain', domain)
// HERE!!! You can 'assemble a complex regex using string pieces.
const re = new RegExp( String.raw `([\'|\"]https:\/\/)(${domain})(\S+[\'|\"])`, 'gm');
// now I'll use the regex expression groups to replace the domain
const domainSubst = `$1${newDomain}$3`;
// const page contains all the html text
const result = page.replace(re, domainSubst);
note: Don't forget to use regex101.com to create, test and export REGEX code.

var string = "Hi welcome to stack overflow"
var toSearch = "stack"
//case insensitive search
var result = string.search(new RegExp(toSearch, "i")) > 0 ? 'Matched' : 'notMatched'
https://jsfiddle.net/9f0mb6Lz/
Hope this helps

How to obtain index of subpattern in JavaScript regexp?

I wrote a regular expression in JavaScript for searching searchedUrl in a string:
var input = '1234 url( test ) 5678';
var searchedUrl = 'test';
var regexpStr = "url\\(\\s*"+searchedUrl+"\\s*\\)";
var regex = new RegExp(regexpStr , 'i');
var match = input.match(regex);
console.log(match); // return an array
Output:
["url( test )", index: 5, input: "1234 url( test ) 5678"]
Now I would like to obtain position of the searchedUrl (in the example above it is the position of test in 1234 url( test ) 5678.
How can I do that?

As far as I could tell it wasn't possible to get the offset of a sub-match automatically, you have to do the calculation yourself using either lastIndex of the RegExp, or the index property of the match object returned by exec(). Depending on which you use you'll either have to add or subtract the length of groups leading up to your sub-match. However, this does mean you have to group the first or last part of the Regular Expression, up to the pattern you wish to locate.
lastIndex only seems to come into play when using the /g/ global flag, and it will record the index after the entire match. So if you wish to use lastIndex you'll need to work backwards from the end of your pattern.
For more information on the exec() method, see here:
https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/RegExp/exec
The following succinctly shows the solution in operation:
var str = '---hello123';
var r = /([a-z]+)([0-9]+)/;
var m = r.exec( str );
alert( m.index + m[1].length ); // will give the position of 123
update
This would apply to your issue using the following:
var input = '1234 url( test ) 5678';
var searchedUrl = 'test';
var regexpStr = "(url\\(\\s*)("+searchedUrl+")\\s*\\)";
var regex = new RegExp(regexpStr , 'i');
var match = regex.exec(input);
Then to get the submatch offset you can use:
match.index + match[1].length
match[1] now contains url( (plus two spaces) due to the bracket grouping which allows us to tell the internal offset.
update 2
Obviously things are a little more complicated if you have patterns in the RegExp, that you wish to group, before the actual pattern you want to locate. This is just a simple act of adding together each group length.
var s = '~- [This may or may not be random|it depends on your perspective] -~';
var r = /(\[)([a-z ]+)(\|)([a-z ]+)(\])/i;
var m = r.exec( s );
To get the offset position of it depends on your perspective you would use:
m.index + m[1].length + m[2].length + m[3].length;
Obviously if you know the RegExp has portions that never change length, you can replace those with hard coded numeric values. However, it's probably best to keep the above .length checks, just in case you — or someone else — ever changes what your expression matches.

JS doesn't have a direct way to get the index of a subpattern/capturing group. But you can work around that with some tricks. For example:
var reStr = "(url\\(\\s*)" + searchedUrl + "\\s*\\)";
var re = new RegExp(reStr, 'i');
var m = re.exec(input);
if(m){
var index = m.index + m[1].length;
console.log("url found at " + index);
}

You can add the 'd' flag to the regex in order to generate indices for substring matches.
const input = '1234 url( test ) 5678';
const searchedUrl = 'test';
const regexpStr = "url\\(\\s*("+searchedUrl+")\\s*\\)";
const regex = new RegExp(regexpStr , 'id');
const match = regex.exec(input).indices[1]
console.log(match); // return [11, 15]

You don't need the index.
This is a case where providing just a bit more information would have gotten a much better answer. I can't fault you for it; we're encouraged to create simple test cases and cut out irrelevant detail.
But one important item was missing: what you plan to do with that index. In the meantime, we were all chasing the wrong problem. :-)
I had a feeling something was missing; that's why I asked you about it.
As you mentioned in the comment, you want to find the URL in the input string and highlight it in some way, perhaps by wrapping it in a <b></b> tag or the like:
'1234 url( <b>test</b> ) 5678'
(Let me know if you meant something else by "highlight".)
You can use character indexes to do that, however there is a much easier way using the regular expression itself.
Getting the index
But since you asked, if you did need the index, you could get it with code like this:
var input = '1234 url( test ) 5678';
var url = 'test';
var regexpStr = "^(.*url\\(\\s*)"+ url +"\\s*\\)";
var regex = new RegExp( regexpStr , 'i' );
var match = input.match( regex );
var start = match[1].length;
This is a bit simpler than the code in the other answers, but any of them would work equally well. This approach works by anchoring the regex to the beginning of the string with ^ and putting all the characters before the URL in a group with (). The length of that group string, match[1], is your index.
Slicing and dicing
Once you know the starting index of test in your string, you could use .slice() or other string methods to cut up the string and insert the tags, perhaps with code something like this:
// Wrap url in <b></b> tag by slicing and pasting strings
var output =
input.slice( 0, start ) +
'<b>' + url + '</b>' +
input.slice( start + url.length );
console.log( output );
That will certainly work, but it is really doing things the hard way.
Also, I left out some error handling code. What if there is no matching URL? match will be undefined and the match[1] will fail. But instead of worrying about that, let's see how we can do it without any character indexing at all.
The easy way
Let the regular expression do the work for you. Here's the whole thing:
var input = '1234 url( test ) 5678';
var url = 'test';
var regexpStr = "(url\\(\\s*)(" + url + ")(\\s*\\))";
var regex = new RegExp( regexpStr , 'i' );
var output = input.replace( regex, "$1<b>$2</b>$3" );
console.log( output );
This code has three groups in the regular expression, one to capture the URL itself, with groups before and after the URL to capture the other matching text so we don't lose it. Then a simple .replace() and you're done!
You don't have to worry about any string lengths or indexes this way. And the code works cleanly if the URL isn't found: it returns the input string unchanged.