How to remove a string of dynamic characters from a string?

Question

I am creating a noob for Android development, and I am trying to remove a string of dynamic characters from a string. My line:

"Beginning of String....<img src="http://webaddress.com" height="1" width="1"/>" 

I want to remove "& lt", "& gt" and everything in between. All I want is "Beginning of the line ..." Until I tried this without success.

 description = description.replaceFirst("(?s)(&lt)(.*?)(&gt)","$1$3"); 

I also tried this on a similar similar line, and it worked fine, so I don’t understand what I am doing wrong.

 description = description.replaceFirst("(?s)(<sub>)(.*?)(</sub>)","$1$3"); 

My class

 public class RssReader { private final static String BOLD_OPEN = "<B>"; private final static String BOLD_CLOSE = "</B>"; private final static String BREAK = "<BR>"; private final static String ITALIC_OPEN = "<I>"; private final static String ITALIC_CLOSE = "</I>"; private final static String SMALL_OPEN = "<SMALL>"; private final static String SMALL_CLOSE = "</SMALL>"; public static List<JSONObject> getLatestRssFeed(){ String feed = "http://feeds.feedburner.com/MetalMarketCommentary"; //http://globoesporte.globo.com/dynamo/futebol/times/vasco/rss2.xml //http://feeds.feedburner.com/GoldMoneyGoldResearch + //http://feeds.feedburner.com/GoldsilvercomNews + //http://feed43.com/7466558277232702.xml //http://feeds.feedburner.com/SilverGoldDaily //http://feeds.feedburner.com/MetalMarketCommentary //http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid1683318714001?bckey=AQ~~,AAAAC59qSJk~,vyxcsD3OtBPHZ2UIrFX2-wdCLTYNyMNn&bclid=1644543007001&bctid=1854182861001 RSSHandler rh = new RSSHandler(); List<Article> articles = rh.getLatestArticles(feed); Log.e("RSS ERROR", "Number of articles " + articles.size()); return fillData(articles); } private static List<JSONObject> fillData(List<Article> articles) { List<JSONObject> items = new ArrayList<JSONObject>(); for (Article article : articles) { JSONObject current = new JSONObject(); try { buildJsonObject(article, current); } catch (JSONException e) { Log.e("RSS ERROR", "Error creating JSON Object from RSS feed"); } items.add(current); } return items; } private static void buildJsonObject(Article article, JSONObject current) throws JSONException { String title = article.getTitle(); String description = article.getDescription(); description = description.replaceFirst("(?s)(<sub>)(.*?)(</sub>)","$1$3"); int start = description.indexOf(".&"); description= description.substring(0, start); String date = article.getPubDate(); String imgLink = article.getImgLink(); StringBuffer sb = new StringBuffer(); sb.append(BOLD_OPEN).append(title).append(BOLD_CLOSE); sb.append(BREAK); sb.append(description); sb.append(BREAK); sb.append(SMALL_OPEN).append(ITALIC_OPEN).append(date).append(ITALIC_CLOSE).append(SMALL_CLOSE); current.put("text", Html.fromHtml(sb.toString())); current.put("imageLink", imgLink); } } 

XML I understand

 <item> <title>Gold Market Recap Report</title> <link>http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MetalMarketCommentary/~3/jGYtkXdSKWs/mid-session-gold_703.html</link> <description>&lt;img src="http://www.cmegroup.com/images/1x1trans.gif?destination=http://www.cmegroup.com/education/market-commentary/metals/2012/09/mid-session-gold_703.html" alt=""/&gt;For the week December gold forged a trading range of roughly $37 an ounce. With gold prices attimes seemingly on the rocks and poised for a downside washout it was a change of pace to see afresh upside breakout in the Friday morning trade....&lt;img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MetalMarketCommentary/~4/jGYtkXdSKWs" height="1" width="1"/&gt;</description> <pubDate>Fri, 21 Sep 2012 19:50:37 GMT</pubDate> <guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.cmegroup.com/education/market-commentary/metals/2012/09/mid-session-gold_703.html?source=rss</guid> <dc:date>2012-09-21T19:50:37Z</dc:date> <feedburner:origLink>http://www.cmegroup.com/education/market-commentary/metals/2012/09/mid-session-gold_703.html?source=rss</feedburner:origLink> </item> 

Answer 1

  String string = "Beginning of String....<img src=\"http://webaddress.com\" height=\"1\" width=\"1\"/>"; //Escape whatever has to be escaped System.out.println(string); int start = string.indexOf("&"); int end = string.lastIndexOf("&"); String temp = string.substring(start, (end+3)); string = string.replace(temp, ""); System.out.println(string); 

This will remove anything between & lt and> gt, including them.

Answer 2

You do not need to use regular expressions for this.

Create a method that finds and removes substrings starting with < and ending in > , and run it in a loop.

 String mstring = "Beginning of String....<img src="http://webaddress.com" height="1" width="1"/>"; // You'll need to escape the double quotes if you're explicitly setting the string public boolean containsTags() { boolean lt, gt; lt = mstring.contains("<"); gt = mstring.contains(">"); return (lt || gt); } public void removeTags() { int indexof_lt, indexof_gt; indexof_lt = mstring.indexOf("<"); indexof_gt = mstring.indexOf(">"); String str_first, str_last; str_first = mstring.substring(0, indexof_lt); str_last = mstring.substring(indexof_gt + indexof_gt.length); mstring = str_first + str_last; } public void removeAllTags() { while(containsTags) { removeTags(); } }