regex for parsing request parameters

Question

Hello!

I am looking for a single perl compatible regex that would parse strings of the form:

param1=value1&...&param2=value2&...

and extract values for param1 and param2 only. But

1. param2 may precede param1
2. There may be no param1 or param2
3. param1 or param2 (or both) may have empty values, i.e. param1=&...

Answer 1

/(.*?)=(.*?)&/ looping through and capturing $1 and $2 should work

Answer 2

I wouldn't bother writing your own request parser. Just use CGI.pm.

Answer 3

/[?&]([^=]+)=([^=&]+)/g

This will match any non = character separated by an = and put them into $1 and $2.

or...

my %argsHash = split(/=|&/, $args);

This will give you a hash with parameters and values which appears to work well, but CGI.pm is all around a better idea.

Answer 4

If this is for C++, consider using an existing CGI library that parses the query parameters for you instead of reinventing that sort of thing yourself.

One such library is cgic, a CGI library for C: http://www.boutell.com/cgic/#functions