RedExp to replace the URl 1

[bean1234]

Hello Experts,

I am using a regular expression to replace a url typed in input with an anchor to display the input, I am using the following code, the RegExp works fine but the replace method cannot replace the matched text.Please advise.

<script>var test_match = /(((\b|^)https?:\/\/)([A-Za-z][^\b]*)+)|(((\b|^)www\.)([A-Za-z][^\b]*)+)/gi
var x="apple [URL unfurl="true"]www.xyz.com";[/URL]
alert(test_match.test(x));
alert(x.replace(test_match,"<a href=\"$1\" title=\"external link\">$1</a>"));
//alert(x);

</script>

 

[bean1234]

Thanks I was able to resolve it but please advise on the efiiciency or correctness of the regular expression.

Thanks!

 

[kaht]

2 things I'll point out:

1. both instances of [!][^\b]*[/!] in your code could be replaced with [!]\B*[/!] to make the regexp slightly shorter.

2. The regexp checks to make sure that each domain starts with a letter, when this is not 100% valid. For example, googling for 123.com produced this:

http://www.123greetings.com/

This means you'll need to check for numbers as the start of each domain as well (among other characters possibly, I'm not sure of all the valid characters a domain can start with)

Here's the amended code for both suggestions:

var test_match = /(((\b|^)https?:\/\/)([A-Za-z[!]0-9[/!]][!]\B*[/!])+)|(((\b|^)www\.)([A-Za-z[!]0-9[/!]][!]\B*[/!])+)/gi

-kaht

http://www.silkypups.com

[small](All puppies have now found loving homes, thanks for all who showed interest)[/small]

 

[bean1234]

Thanks Kaht

Here's the modified RegExp

/((((\b|^)https?:\/\/)|((\b|^)www\.))(([A-Za-z\d][\B]*)+))/gi