NSDataDetector to detect a name in a string

Question

I have been struggling to understand the NSDataDetector class for a little while now. I've read the documentation and just can't grasp it. Everything I do Xcode tells me there is an error.

I feel like I might be on the right path with this attempt. How can I write a simple foundation program to find name in a string?

 NSError *error = nil;
    NSDataDetector *detector = [NSDataDetector dataDetectorWithTypes:NSTextCheckingTypeAddress error:&error];
    NSString *string = @"(555) 555-5555 / Nick";
    NSArray *matches = [detector matchesInString:string
                                         options:0
                                           range:NSMakeRange(0, [string length])];

    for (NSTextCheckingResult *match in matches) {
        if([match addressComponents] // contains NSTextCheckingNameKey){
            // do this
        }
    }

Answer 1

Your code uses a data detector that looks for an address. There is no address in your string. Therefore the data detector can't find anything.

There is no data detector for finding a name.

If you know the structure of the string, then use it. For example, if you can guarantee that there will always be "space-slash-space" before the name as in your example, then search for that and take what follows to be a name.

If you do not know the structure of the string, the problem is pretty much unsolvable.

Answer 2

NSDataDetector does not support name detection. Use NSLinguisticTagger for this instead.