Implementing a split (or a pseudo-split) for StringBuffers/Builders

One of the functionalities regrettably absent from the StringBuilder/StringBuffer families is the inbuilt and nice String method split(String regexp) (q.v. java.lang.String.split()), which will produce a tokenised array of Strings based around and consuming the supplied regexp token. The cranky way of doing this with a Stringbuffer is to cast your lightweight StringBuffer to a String, split to an array of Strings, then cast the array of Strings back to a StringBuffer array or List, which to me looks somewhat like defeating the object of the entire exercise in working with StringBuffers. I have a marked preference for working with Lists as opposed to arrays but I do realise that there are those of the other faith who have valid reasons for their heretical idolatry (j/k) so I’ll provide methods for both outcomes.

Given that we have a method for providing a List of token positions from a supplied StringBuffer (q.v. Locating token positions[..]) (and I have a somewhat improved method for doing this which I will anyway supply as an appendage to this post – the refactored method has been renamed getTokenPositions as opposed to the earlier findTokens) the way is clear for us to implement the new split method.

/** Method to split an inbound StringBuffer by (consumed) tokens and produce a List 
* @param StringBuffer sbx - the StringBuffer to split
* @param StringBuffer sbTok - a StringBuffer representation of token(s) to use to split
* @return List of StringBuffers split out
*/
public List split(StringBuffer sbx, StringBuffer sbTok)
    {
    int tokSz = sbTok.length();
    List lix = new ArrayList();
    List lPos = getTokenPositions(sbx, sbTok );
    if( lPos.isEmpty() || lPos == null) // no split?  send the original sb back
    {
        lix.add(sbx);
        return lix;
    }

    int start = 0;
    if(lPos.get(0) == 0)
    {
    start += tokSz;
    }

    int iSz = lPos.size();

        for (int i = 0; i < iSz; i++) {
            StringBuffer sbnew = new StringBuffer();
        if(i + 1 == iSz)
        {
        sbnew = new StringBuffer(sbx.subSequence(start, sbx.length()));
        }
        else
        {
                sbnew = new StringBuffer(sbx.subSequence(start, lPos.get(i + 1)));
                start = lPos.get(i + 1) + tokSz;
            }
           // System.out.println(sbnew.toString());
            lix.add(sbnew);
        }

    return lix;
    }

To produce an Array of StringBuffers, you merely need to change the return method signature

public StringBuffer[] split(StringBuffer sbx, StringBuffer sbTok)

and modify the code where the returns occur (2 places) to read:

 return (StringBuffer[]) lix.toArray();

Modified method for providing a List of token positions

I mentioned earlier I had a somewhat improved version of the findTokens method. The code for this (+ the comparator-helper List construction methods) follows:

 public List getTokenPositions(StringBuffer sbx, StringBuffer tok )
    {
    List liTok = charListFromSb(tok);
    List liOut = new ArrayList();
    int sz = tok.length() - 1;
    int finish = sbx.length() - sz;
    char firstTok = tok.charAt(0);
    char lastTok = tok.charAt(sz);
        for (int i = 0; i < finish; i++) {
            if ( (sbx.charAt(i) == firstTok)   && (sbx.charAt(i + sz) == lastTok) )
            {
            List comp =  charListFromSb(sbx, i, i+ sz);
            if (comp.equals(liTok))
              {
                boolean add = liOut.add(i);
              }
            }
        }
    return liOut;
    }

 public List charListFromSb(StringBuffer sbx)
    {
        List liOut = new ArrayList();
        int iEnd = sbx.length();
        for (int i = 0; i < iEnd; i++) {
            boolean add = liOut.add(sbx.charAt(i));
        }

    return liOut;
    }
 public List<Character> charListFromSb(StringBuffer sbx, int start, int finish)
    {
       
        List<Character> liOut = new ArrayList<Character>();
        for (int i = start; i <= finish; i++) {
            boolean add = liOut.add(sbx.charAt(i));
        }
    return liOut;
    }

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