Regular Expressions firstname.middlename.lastname split and delete middlename and “.”

Question

I am looking for a Regex that will split a firstname.middlename.lastname into:

First Middle Last

But then deletes the entire middle name (including the periods between the first and last name)

I am passing this to a textbox to display the firstname lastname to the user.

If it makes any difference I am using winforms for this.

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Thanks to the quick action of some kind people on this forum here is the answer to my solution!:

        string strName =  Environment.UserName.ToString();
        strName = System.Threading.Thread.CurrentThread.CurrentCulture.TextInfo.ToTitleCase(strName.ToLower());

        String shortName = Regex.Replace(strName, @"[.]\w*[.]", " ");

        uxCreator.SelectedText = shortName;

Answer 1

Unless there's some pressing reason to use Regex I'd go for the more simple:

String fullName = "Harry.Bob.McGraw";
String[] names = fullName.Split('.');
String shortName = String.Format("{0} {1}", names[0], names[2]);

This gives you the shortened name in shortName.

Also, if you really must have Regex, then you could use

String fullName = "Harry.Bob.McGraw";
String shortName = Regex.Replace(fullName, @"[.]\w*[.]", " ");

Answer 2

How about something very simple (without the split)?

string input = "Harry.Bob.McGraw";
string pattern = @"(?<=\w+)\.\w+\.(?=\w+)";

var result = Regex.Replace( input, pattern, " " );

// result = "Harry McGraw"

You can use the same expression for splitting:

var result = Regex.Split( input, pattern );

// result[0] = "Harry"
// result[1] = "McGraw"

Note: The regex is fundamentally no different from Matrin's. I've included the zero-width assertions (aka lookarounds) in case you want to apply this to a larger body of text.

Answer 3

I wouldn't use a RegEx. It's easier to use the string manipulation functions:

http://www.developerfusion.com/code/4398/string-manipulation-in-c/