Separating a string into substrings

Question

I want to separate a string consisting of one or more two-letter codes separated by commas into two-letter substrings and put them in a string array or other suitable data structure. The result is at one point to be databound to a combo box so this needs to be taken into account.

The string I want to manipulate can either be empty, consist of two letters only or be made up by multiple two-letter codes separated by commas (and possibly a space).

I was thinking of using a simple string array but I'm not sure if this is the best way to go.

So... what data structure would you recommend that I use and how would you implement it?

Answer 1

If you are simply going to bind to the structure then a String[] ought to be fine - if you need to work with the data before you use it as a data source then a List<String> is probably a better choice.

Here is an example:

using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;

class Program
{
    static void Main()
    {
     String s = "ab,cd,ef";

     // either a String[]
     String[] array = s.Split(new Char[] {','});
     // or a List<String>
     List<String> list = new List<String>(s.Split(new Char[] { ',' }));
    }
}

Answer 2

Definitely at least start with a string array, because it's the return type of string.Split():

string MyCodes = "AB,BC,CD";
char[] delimiters = new char[] {',', ' '};
string[] codes = MyCodes.Split(delimiters, StringSplitOptions.RemoveEmptyEntries);

Update: added space to the delimiters. That will have the effect of trimming spaces from your result strings.

Answer 3

My answer is "right", but I suggest Joel Coehoorn's answer.

public static string[] splitItems(string inp)
{
    if(inp.Length == 0)
     return new string[0];
    else
     return inp.Split(',');
}

Answer 4

Would something like this work?

var list = theString.Split(", ".ToCharArray(), StringSplitOptions.RemoveEmptyEntries).ToList();