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Thread: finding String in a file

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    Default finding String in a file

    Is there any straight way to find an string in a file? I know how to read a file line by line and see if the string exits there or not, but I am looking for a shorter way.


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    Default Re: finding String in a file

    Don't think there is a shorter way than reading the file. If you are on unix or linux you could grep it using the exec() command, but that ends up making the program platform specific.

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    Default Re: finding String in a file

    With the given constraints (very few), the best you can get is O(n) by sequentially comparing the two data sets.

    You can speed up the amount of comparisons that are being done via multi-threading (have one thread to start reading from the front, have the second thread read from the end), but you are still left with an O(n) algorithm.

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    Default Re: finding String in a file

    would you please tell me what is O(n)

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    Default Re: finding String in a file

    Big O notation - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
    It essentially describes the complexity/performance of an algorithm (usually in terms of a worst case scenario). O(n) is considered linear, eg its performance is directly related to the size of the input.

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    Default Re: finding String in a file

    I have an html file and I am trying to find something like "<html>
    <head>

    </head>
    <body>
    <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_present_value" class="l">Net <em>present</em>
    value - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia</a>"
    </body>
    </html>

    in it. when I see the html file in a browser I see that this content exists in the file but when I am trying to use following code it doesn't find the content that I am looking for

     
    // file has been read and its contet is in an StringBbuilder named Lines
    // what I am searching for is in a string named search
     
    if (lines.toString().contains(search))
    System.out.println("yes");
    else
    System.out.println("no");

    ofcourse when I check the source code of the file I see that there are some differences in comparison to the content that I am looking for. now I am thinking about two solutions. Is there any modification that I can do to fix the problem with the above approach? or is it possible to compare these two, using another way that doesn't compare the source codes but their form in web browser.or any other way?

    please help me I am really stuck.

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    Default Re: finding String in a file

    How should I find

     href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Primary_care" l="l"

    in the following String?

     
    <html>
      <head>
     
      </head>
      <body>
        <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Primary_care" l="l">Primary <em>care</em> 
        - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia</a>
     
        <div s="s">
          Primary <em>care</em> is the term for the health services that play a 
          central role in the local community. It refers to the work of health <em>care</em> 
          professionals who act <b>...</b><br><span f="f"><cite>en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Primary_<b>care</b></cite> 
          - </span><span gl="gl"><a href="http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:pnenOs-Aj-0J:en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Primary_care+care+site:wikipedia.org&cd=4&hl=en&ct=clnk">Cached 
          </a></span>
        </div>
      </body>
    </html>
    Last edited by nasi; May 22nd, 2010 at 02:47 AM.

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    Default Re: finding String in a file

    String.indexOf(..) will give you the starting position. String.contains(..) will tell you if it is present.

    It's always worth checking the API of the class you're using - in fact, one might say you shouldn't use a class unless you know what it can do (you can find out exactly how it dies it in the API docs and tutorials).

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    Default Re: finding String in a file

    Thanks. I know these methods. the problem is that
    String Str = new String("href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Primary_care" l="l"");

    doesn't work and generates errors because of multiple quotations("). I don't know how to wrtie this String.

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    Senile Half-Wit Freaky Chris's Avatar
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    Default Re: finding String in a file

    String str = new String("href=\"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Primary_care\" l=\"l\"");

    Chris

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    Default Re: finding String in a file

    May be overkill but you might consider using a Regular Expression if you want your code to be a lot more extensible. Like I said in certain situations its overkill, but does the trick in more difficult situations where you are looking more for patterns rather than concrete strings (such as parsing html).

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    Default Re: finding String in a file

    I have an String and I am looking for a subString in this String which starts with "what is new?" and ends with "Todays last news". I know that I can use string.contains(substring) but I don't know how to define the substring in a way that I mentioned. would you please tell me how to do it?

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    Default Re: finding String in a file

    Have you looked at the definition of the String.contains() method?
    it says
    Returns true if and only if this string contains the specified sequence of char values.
    CharSequence is an interface that a class can implement. The String class implements it.

    To find a subString in a string that starts with x and ends with y, you could use: indexOf(x) and indexOf(y, x_loc), compute the offset and endLoc and then use the substring method to extract the substring.

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