Using Regular Expressions to Extract a Value in Java

Question

I have several strings in the rough form:

[some text] [some number] [some more text]

I want to extract the text in [some number] using the

Answer 1

Simple Solution

// Regexplanation:
// ^       beginning of line
// \\D+    1+ non-digit characters
// (\\d+)  1+ digit characters in a capture group
// .*      0+ any character
String regexStr = "^\\D+(\\d+).*";

// Compile the regex String into a Pattern
Pattern p = Pattern.compile(regexStr);

// Create a matcher with the input String
Matcher m = p.matcher(inputStr);

// If we find a match
if (m.find()) {
    // Get the String from the first capture group
    String someDigits = m.group(1);
    // ...do something with someDigits
}

Solution in a Util Class

public class MyUtil {
    private static Pattern pattern = Pattern.compile("^\\D+(\\d+).*");
    private static Matcher matcher = pattern.matcher("");

    // Assumptions: inputStr is a non-null String
    public static String extractFirstNumber(String inputStr){
        // Reset the matcher with a new input String
        matcher.reset(inputStr);

        // Check if there's a match
        if(matcher.find()){
            // Return the number (in the first capture group)
            return matcher.group(1);
        }else{
            // Return some default value, if there is no match
            return null;
        }
    }
}

...

// Use the util function and print out the result
String firstNum = MyUtil.extractFirstNumber("Testing4234Things");
System.out.println(firstNum);