How to split comma-separated string but exclude some words containing comma in Java

Question

Assume that we have below string:

"test01,test02,test03,exceptional,case,test04"

What I want is to split the string into string array, like below:

["test01","test02","test03","exceptional,case","test04"]

How can I do that in Java?

Answer 1

This negative lookaround regex should work for you:

(?<!exceptional),|,(?!case)

Working Demo

Java Code:

String[] arr = str.split("(?<!exceptional),|,(?!case)");

Explanation:

This regex matches a comma if any one of these 2 conditions meet:

1. comma is not preceded by word exceptional using negative lookbehind (?<!exceptional)
2. comma is not followed by word case using negative lookahead (?!case)

That effectively disallows splitting on comma when it is surrounded by exceptional and case on either side.