replace multiple same character in string with singe character in ruby

Question

I have a dynamically generated string which can have any number of ":" in-between them example.

example1: "test string:: this is test string"
example2: "test string:::: this is test string"

I want to convert such string into following

result string1: "test string: this is test string"
result string2: "test string: this is test string"

Please help

Answer 1

Use String#squeeze .

"test string:::: this is test string".squeeze(':')
  #=> "test string: this is test string"

"test string:::: this is:: test string".squeeze(':')
  #=> "test string: this is: test string"

Another way is to use String#gsub (or String#sub if there is at most one run of colons in the string).

"test string:::: this is:: test string".gsub(/:+/, ':')
  #=> "test string: this is: test string"