Is there a lazy `String.Split` in C#

Question

All string.Split methods seems to return an array of strings (string[]).

I'm wondering if there is a lazy variant that returns an IEnumerable<string> such that one for large strings (or an infinite length IEnumerable<char>), when one is only interested in a first subsequences, one saves computational effort as well as memory. It could also be useful if the string is constructed by a device/program (network, terminal, pipes) and the entire strings is thus not necessary immediately fully available. Such that one can already process the first occurences.

Is there such method in the .NET framework?

Answer 1

You could easily write one:

public static class StringExtensions
{
    public static IEnumerable<string> Split(this string toSplit, params char[] splits)
    {
        if (string.IsNullOrEmpty(toSplit))
            yield break;

        StringBuilder sb = new StringBuilder();

        foreach (var c in toSplit)
        {
            if (splits.Contains(c))
            {
                yield return sb.ToString();
                sb.Clear();
            }
            else
            {
                sb.Append(c);
            }
        }

        if (sb.Length > 0)
            yield return sb.ToString();
    }
}

Clearly, I haven't tested it for parity with string.split, but I believe it should work just about the same.

As Servy notes, this doesn't split on strings. That's not as simple, and not as efficient, but it's basically the same pattern.

public static IEnumerable<string> Split(this string toSplit, string[] separators)
{
    if (string.IsNullOrEmpty(toSplit))
        yield break;

    StringBuilder sb = new StringBuilder();
    foreach (var c in toSplit)
    {
        var s = sb.ToString();
        var sep = separators.FirstOrDefault(i => s.Contains(i));
        if (sep != null)
        {
            yield return s.Replace(sep, string.Empty);
            sb.Clear();
        }
        else
        {
            sb.Append(c);
        }
    }

    if (sb.Length > 0)
        yield return sb.ToString();
}