Regex to be able to make an array which is present within []-CodePudding

I am trying to split a string into an array of words that is present within [] as the limiters. Text within [] should be only considered. Consider a string being =>

const stringA = '[@Mary James], [@Jennifer John] and [@Johnny Lever[@Patricia Robert] are present in the meeting and [@Jerry[@Jeffery Roger] is absent.'

Now I want to break the string into an array that will only contain the string within [].

const stringB = ['Mary James', 'Jennifer John', 'Patricia Robert', 'Jeffery Roger'];

Any logic can be applied to be able to the needed resolution.

On searching found a regex =>

stringA.match(/(?<=\[@)[^\]]*(?=\])/g);

But the above doesn't fullfill my requirement.

The above regex gives me

const wrong = ['Mary James', 'Jennifer John', 'Johnny Lever[@Patricia Robert', 'Jerry[@Jeffery Roger'];

The required array doesn't match to the recieved array from the above regex.

CodePudding user response：

Close, just missing the exclusion of [:

stringA.match(/(?<=\[@)[^\[\]]*(?=\])/g);
//                       ^^ exclude '[' as well as ']'

CodePudding user response：

The OP's regex does not feature the opening bracket within the negated character class, thus changing the OP's /(?<=\[@)[^\]]*(?=\])/g to (?<=\[@)[^\[\]]*(?=\]) already solves the OP's problem for most environments not including safari browsers due to the lookbehind which is not supported.

Solution based on a regex ... /\[@(?<content>[^\[\]] )\]/g ... with a named capture group ...

const sampleText = '[@Mary James], [@Jennifer John] and [@Johnny Lever[@Patricia Robert] are present in the meeting and [@Jerry[@Jeffery Roger] is absent.'

// see ... [https://regex101.com/r/v234aT/1]
const regXCapture = /\[@(?<content>[^\[\]] )\]/g;

console.log(
  Array.from(
    sampleText.matchAll(regXCapture)
  ).map(
    ({ groups: { content } }) => content
  )
);