Ruby: Gsub - multiple string replacements in a single line [in an array]

Question

is there a way to replace multiple strings in a single line of array using gsub.

here is the log file

13:29:00 (alex) OUT: "72500_2010_0F" abcd@S400532  
13:31:12 (alex) IN: "72600_2010_0F" abnc@S403818
13:31:52 (alex) IN: "71200_2010_0F" osa@S400583

I would like to replace the below

(alex) with "" 
OUT:  with OUT
IN: with IN
"72500_2010_0F" with XYZ
"71200_2010_0F" with QWE
"72600_2010_0F" with UIO

The original file (log file) is put into array and I wanted to read each line in the array and perform gsub. Dont want to use Hash as its lil complicated -As being Ruby Beginner...& to Regex...

array1.each do |element|
  i = element.gsub(/?????????/) [ What should go here]
  array2.push(i)
end

I dint want to make changes to original array but push the modified lines into different array ie array2

What is the best & easy to understand code to do this? - Please help

Answer 1

Looking at String#sub it seems there are many ways to do what you want:

1. One approach can be to use a hash as second parameter

    def cleansed_log_line(line) replacement_rules = { 'alex' => '', 'OUT: ' => 'OUT ', 'IN: ' => 'IN ' } matcher = /#{replacement_rules.keys.join('|')}/ line.gsub(matcher, replacement_rules) end 

2. Another approach can be to to use block form

    def cleansed_log_line(line) replacement_rules = { 'alex' => '', 'OUT: ' => 'OUT ', 'IN: ' => 'IN ' } matcher = /#{replacement_rules.keys.join('|')}/ line.gsub(matcher) do |match| replacement_rules[match] || match end end 

3. Another not so good implementation

    def cleansed_log_line(line) replacement_rules = { /alex/ => '', 'OUT: ' => 'OUT ', 'IN: ' => 'IN ' } replacement_rules.each do |match, replacement| line = line.gsub(match, replacement) end line end 

Hashes and RegEx are nothing to worry about. This function can cleanse any line passed to it and would return a cleansed line.