Get Text After Regex Match in Java

Getting the Text That Follows After the Regex Match in Java

Regular expressions are a powerful and versatile tool when it comes to pattern matching and text manipulation. In Java, a regular expression (or regex) can be used to match patterns of text within strings. In some cases, you may need to get the text that follows after the regex match. This article will explain how to do this using Java.

Using String.split()

The String.split() method can be used to divide a string into an array using a regex. By using a capturing group within the regex, we can access the text that follows the match.

Let's look at an example. Suppose we have a string with text between two delimiters like so:

"this is the start{example text}and this is the end"

To get the text between the delimiters we could use the following regex:

"start(.*?)end"

Now we can split the string into two pieces using our regex as the delimiter, like so:

String[] parts = str.split("start(.*?)end")

The text that follows the match is now stored in the second element of the array, which can be accessed using the index 1. The following code will print out the text that follows the match:

System.out.println(parts[1]); // prints "example text"

Using Matcher.find() & Matcher.group()

The Matcher.find() and Matcher.group() methods can also be used to get the text that follows after the regex match. The Matcher.find() method will search for the regex pattern within the string and, if found, store the position and length of the matched text. The Matcher.group() method can then be used to get the substring that matches the regex.

Let's look at another example. Suppose we have a string with text between two delimiters like before:

"this is the start{example text}and this is the end"

To get the text between the delimiters we could again use the following regex:

"start(.*?)end"

Now we can search for the regex within the string using the Matcher.find() method, like so:

Matcher m = Pattern.compile("start(.*?)end").matcher(str);

If the regex is found, we can use the Matcher.group() method to get the substring that matches the regex:

if (m.find()) { System.out.println(m.group(1)); // prints "example text" }

Using this method, we can easily get the text that follows after the regex match.

Conclusion

In this article, we looked at two different ways to get the text that follows after the regex match in Java. We saw that the String.split() method can be used to divide a string into an array using a regex, and that the Matcher.find() and Matcher.group() methods can be used to search for and get the substring that matches the regex. With these methods, you should be able to quickly and easily get the text that follows after the regex match.