I want to parse a table line using regex.

Input

   |---|---|---|
|---|---|---|

So far I've come up with this regex:

/^(?<indent>\s*)\|(?<cell>- |)/g

Regex101 Link: https://regex101.com/r/wzMYxd/1

But this regex is incomplete.

This only finds the first cell --|, but I want to find all the following cells as different ----|.

Question: Can we catch the following cells with the same pattern using the regex? ExpectedOutput: groups with array of matched cells: ["---|", "----|", "---|"]

Note: no constant number of - is required

CodePudding user response：

How about first checking, if all the line matches the pattern:

^[ \t]*\|(?:- \|) $

See this demo at regex101 - If it matches, extract your stuff:

(?<cell>- )\||^(?<indent>[\t ]*)\|

Another demo at regex101 (explanation on the right side)

With just one regex maybe by sticky flag y and use of a lookahead for validation.

/^(?<indent>[ \t]*)\|(?=(?:- \|) $)|(?!^)(?<cell>- )\|/gy

One more demo at regex101

The lookahead checks once after the first | if the rest of the string matches the pattern. If this first match fails, due to the y flag (matches are "glued" to each other) the rest of the pattern fails too.