How to read textarea with certain condition

Question

I have a textarea in which the user enters the following data:

1. Paul:Nine, Rome
2. Jenny:Five, India
3. Bob

I want to read the data and store the values before the colon in an array and the values after the colon in another array. Please note that the user may not enter values after the colon like in case 3 above. In such case, the value must be stored in the first array as if it is before the colon.

How can I do that using jquery?

Answer 1

You can use text() and split

var arrDetails = $("#txtareaid").text().split(':');

//arrDetails[0] will get the string before colon
//arrDetails[1] will get the string after colon

If there is no colon then arrDetails[1] will be undefined

Answer 2

Something like this:

 var txt = $('#your_array').text();
 var lines = txt.split('\n');
 var data = new Array();
 for(var i=0;i<lines.length;i++){
     var o = {};
     var array1 = txt.split(':');
     o.name = array1[0];
     if(array1.length > 1){
         var array2 = array1[1].split(',');
         o.number = array2[0];
         if(array2.length > 1){
             o.location = array2[1];
         }
     }
     data.push(o);
 }

 /*
   data = [
         { name: "Paul", number: "Nine", location: "Rome" },
         { name: "Jenny", number: "Five", location: "India" },
         { name: "Bob" }
     ];
 */

• Processes each line separately.
• Handles missing data in any field.