IsStyledString(string str)

Test if a string is a StyledString

Return

boolean: true or nil (for false).

IsNumeric(string str)

Is str representing a number?

Return

boolean: true or nil (for false)

Example

IsNumeric("-22.5") --> true
 IsNumeric("-.5") --> true
 IsNumeric(".12") --> true
 IsNumeric("0.12") --> true
 IsNumeric("1.") --> false
 IsNumeric("123abc") --> false

EscapePercent(string str)

Escape a string that contain a % that can be interpreted in Lua string functions like gsub.

Return

string: % are escaped by a %.

string_split(string s, string delim, int limit)

Split the string s by a string delimiter delim.

Return

table: An array of at least one item (s if delim is not found)

Example

local t = string_split("Hello World!", " ")
 print(t[1]) --> Hello
 print(t[2]) --> World!

string_split_lines(string s)

Split the string s by lines, handle \r, \n and \r\n.

Return

table: A table of at least one element (s if line separator is not found)

string_slice(string s, int sze, boolean fromEnd)

Slice the string into blocks of size, except last one that may be shorter.

Return

table: A table of slices of s

Error

if s is not a string, or size is not a positive number

string_join(table list, string delimiter)

Concat the elements of table list, separated by the string delimiter.

Return

string: string

Example

string_join({"Anna", "Bob", "Charlie", "Dolores"}, ", ")
 --> Anna, Bob, Charlie, Dolores

string_concat(string src, string delimiter, ...)

Concatenate toAdd after src with a delimiter, handles nil and empty string initialization.

• s is not concatenated if empty,
• delimiter is not inserted if src is nil or empty.

myList = string_concat(myList, ", ", "an item") is a a shortcut for myList = (myList and (myList..", ") or "") .. "an item" with more nil handling.

Return

string: string

Error

if s is nil

string_trim(string s, string toTrim, string side)

Removes toTrim at the beginning and the end of s.

Return

string: The trimmed string

Example

string_trim(" abcd\t")) --> "abcd"
 string_trim(" abcd\t", nil, "left") --> "abcd\t"
 string_trim(" abcd\t", "a \t") --> "bcd"
 string_trim(" abcd\t", "()") --> " abcd\t"

string_left(string str, int n)

Return the n leftmost chars of the string str.

Return

string: A string of strlen(str) to n chars: strsub(str, 1, n)

Error

if str is not a string or n <= 0

string_right(string str, int n)

Return the n rightmost chars of the string str.

Return

string: A string of strlen(str) to n chars: strsub(str, -n)

Error

if str is not a string or n <= 0

string_starts_with(string str, string leftStr)

Does str starts with leftStr?

Return

boolean: true if string_left(str, strlen(leftStr)) == leftStr, nil for false.

Error

if str is not a string, or strlen(leftStr) == 0

string_ends_with(string str, string rightStr)

Does str ends with rightStr?

Return

boolean: true if string_right(str, strlen(rightStr)) == rightStr, nil for false.

Error

if str is not a string, or strlen(rightStr) == 0

string_between(string str, string left, string right)

Return the portion of str found between left and right.

Return

string: nil if left or right are not found in str.

string_line_to_space(string str)

Replace line \r and \n characters by a space.

Return

string: string

excel_column_name(int n)

Returns the Excel column name of the n-th column.

"A" for 1, "B" for 2, "Z" for 26, "AA" for 27...

Return

string: string

Example

excel_column_name(123) --> "DS"

string_time(number seconds, boolean exact, boolean clockFormat)

Converts a time (music duration, debug chrono...) into readable string.

Return

string: "10 ms", "3 s 456 ms", "1 min 14 s", 00:03.010...

See

Stopwatch:new

Example

 s = 1.0102345 -- 1 second, 10,2345 ms
 print(string_time(s)) --> "1.01 s"
 print(string_time(s, true)) --> "1 s 10.234 ms"
 print(string_time(s, false, true)) --> "00:01.010"
 print(string_time(s, true, true)) --> "00:01.010234"
 s = s + 2*60 -- add 2 minutes
 print(string_time(s)) --> "2 min 1 s"
 print(string_time(s, true)) --> "2 min 1 s 10.234 ms"
 print(string_time(s, false, true)) --> "02:01.010"
 print(string_time(s, true, true)) --> "02:01.010234"

string_first(string a, string b)

Returns the first of a and b in alphabetical order.

Comparable to max(a,b) for numbers.

Return

string: string

Example

print(string_first("Hello", "Harmony")) --> "Harmony"

string_last(string a, string b)

Returns the last of a and b in alphabetical order.

Comparable to max(a,b) for numbers.

Return

string: string

Example

print(string_last("Harmony", "Assistant")) --> "Harmony"

SplitUrl(string url)

Split an URL into protocol, host, path, query and anchor.

Return

table: Table t with following structure for https://www.myriad-online.com/cgi-bin/bbs/YaBB.pl?board=MYRSCRIPT;action=display;num=1652718688#2

t.Protocol = "https"
 t.Host = "www.myriad-online.com"
 t.Domain = "myriad-online.com"
 t.TLD = "com" -- top level domain, secondary "co.uk", "gouv.fr" are ignored
 t.Path = "cgi-bin/bbs/YaBB.pl"
 t.File = "YaBB.pl"
 t.FileExtension = "pl"
 t.Query = "board=MYRSCRIPT;action=display;num=1652718688"
 t.Anchor = "2"

Some of these field may be empty string or nil

Error

if url is nil or empty string

SplitPath(string path)

Split a path into directory and file, no file if path ends by a '/'.

Returns

string: directory

string: file name

RemoveDiacritics(string s, boolean specialChars)

Remove diacritics (accents) from the string s.

Return

The string without diacritics, e.g. 'á' is replaced by 'a'.

Error

if s is not a string

See

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diacritic

escape_lines(string s)

Escape lines \n and \r as well as tabs \t and backslash \, using backslashes \.

Return

string: escaped string.

See

unescape_lines

Example

 s = "string\twith\nnew line"
 print(s) --> string  with
          --> new line
 print(escape_lines(s)) --> string\twith\nnew line

unescape_lines(string s)

Unescape lines \n and \r as well as tabs \t and backslash \, escaped by backslashes.

Return

string: unescaped string ready to be printed.

See

escape_lines

Example

 s = "string\\twith\\nnew line"
 print(s) --> string\twith\nnew line
 print(unescape_lines(s)) --> string  with
                          --> new line

gsub_args(string str, ...)

Replace %1, %2 in str by first and second following arguments.

This is a convenient way to write the following code:
return gsub(gsub(str, "%%1", "1st value"), "%%2", "2nd value")

gsub return 2 value, the string and number of substitutions. Strangely, nested gsub accept the second returned value, but if you write gsub(str, 1, "%%2", "2nd value") you get an error.
But the second returned value may disturb your functions!
This variant return only the modified string, it may save you debugging headaches ;)

Return

string: The replaced string

Error

If one argument has unsupported type.

Example

 local s = "Hello %1, I want %2."
 print(gsub_args(s, "Bob", "bananas")) --> Hello Bob, I want bananas.

CompareStrings(string str1, string str2, boolean style)

Compare two strings, returns a combination of both with +/- and green/red styling to identify removed and added chars.

Returns

string: Combination of both string, including removed and added chars. To determinate which chars has been modified, you need style to true (for visual) or the second returned string (for parsing).

string: A string of same length describing which chars has been modified:

• Added chars are marked with a + (plus)
• Removed chars are marked with a - (minus)
• Common/unchanged chars ar marked with a space.

int: Number of added chars

int: Number of removed chars

int: Number of unchanged chars

See

CompareTextFiles

CompareTables

CommonLeftSubsequence(...)

Return the left subsequence that starts all strings in argument.

Return

string: The subsequence

Example

 print(CommonLeftSubsequence("abc", "abd")) --> "ab"
 print(CommonLeftSubsequence({"bac", "abc"})) --> ""

strfind_last(string s, string pattern, boolean plain)

Looks for the last match of pattern in string s.

If it finds one, then it returns the indices of s where this occurrence starts and ends; otherwise, it returns nil. If the pattern specifies regexp captures, the captured strings are returned as extra results. If optional plain argument is true, turns off the regexp pattern matching facilities, so the function does a plain find operation, with no characters in pattern being considered magic.

Returns

int: start position of found substring, or nil if no match.

int: end position of found substring

string: Optional returned values if pattern contains captures.

strfind_all(string s, string pattern, boolean plain, boolean allowOverlap)

Looks for all matches of pattern in string s.

Each occurence produce an item in the returned table:

• indice of s where it starts;
• Indice of s where it ends;
• If the pattern specifies regexp captures, the captured strings are added as extra results.

If optional plain argument is true, turns off the regexp pattern matching facilities, so the function does a plain find operation, with no characters in pattern being considered magic.

Return

table: An item is an occurence, which is a table of:

1. int start position of occurence,
2. int end position of occurence,
3. Optional string first capture,
4. Optional string second capture...

If no occurence found, the table is empty.

toBytes(string s)

Convert a string into a table of bytes (integers).

Return

table: table

See

string2RawTable that converts to , which allow hash operations.

fromBytes(table bytes)

Convert a table of bytes (integers) into a string.

Return

string: string

string2RawTable(string s)

Convert a string into a which allow hash operation.

Return

RawTable: RawTable

See

toBytes that converts to table

Example

 local str = "abc"
 local rt = string2RawTable(str)
 local md5 = rt.MD5Digest --> 900150983cd24fb0d6963f7d28e17f72
 local fastHash = rt.Hash --> a2f8b62e5f34c610