Regex to replace all string literals in a Java file

Question

In my program I will be reading a java file line by line, and if there is any string literal in that line, i will replace it with (say) \"ABC\".

Is there any

Answer 1

Based on Uri's answer of using the parser grammar in this question:

"(?:\\[\\'"tnbfru01234567]|[^\\"])*?"

as Java string:

"\"(?:\\\\[\\\\'\"tnbfru01234567]|[^\\\\\"])*?\""

Explanation (see also Java String escape sequences):

"                          // start with a double quote
  (?:                      // a non-capture group
    \\[\\'"tnbfru01234567] // either an escape sequence
  |                        // or
    [^\\"]                 // not an escape sequence start or ending double quote
  )*?                      // zero or more times, not greedy
"                          // ending double quote

Example (jlordo's solution fails on this):

    String literal = "String foo = \"\\\\\" + \"bar\" + \"with\\\"escape\" + \"baz\" + \"\\117\\143\\164\\141\\154\";";
    String regex = "\"(?:\\\\[\\\\'\"tnbfru01234567]|[^\\\\\"])*?\"";
    String replacement = "\"\"";
    String wanted = literal.replaceAll(regex, replacement);
    System.out.println(literal);
    System.out.println(wanted);