How do you use String.substringWithRange? (or, how

Question

I have not yet been able to figure out how to get a substring of a String in Swift:

var str = “Hello, playground”
func test(str: String) -> String {
 return str.substringWithRange( /* What goes here? */ )
}
test (str)

I'm not able to create a Range in Swift. Autocomplete in the Playground isn’t super helpful - this is what it suggests:

return str.substringWithRange(aRange: Range<String.Index>)

I haven't found anything in the Swift Standard Reference Library that helps. Here was another wild guess:

return str.substringWithRange(Range(0, 1))

And this:

let r:Range<String.Index> = Range<String.Index>(start: 0, end: 2)
return str.substringWithRange(r)

I've seen other answers (Finding index of character in Swift String) that seem to suggest that since String is a bridge type for NSString, the "old" methods should work, but it's not clear how - e.g., this doesn't work either (doesn't appear to be valid syntax):

let x = str.substringWithRange(NSMakeRange(0, 3))

Thoughts?

Answer 1

It is much more simple than any of the answers here, once you find the right syntax.

I want to take away the [ and ]

let myString = "[ABCDEFGHI]"
let startIndex = advance(myString.startIndex, 1) //advance as much as you like
let endIndex = advance(myString.endIndex, -1)
let range = startIndex..<endIndex
let myNewString = myString.substringWithRange( range )

result will be "ABCDEFGHI" the startIndex and endIndex could also be used in

let mySubString = myString.substringFromIndex(startIndex)

and so on!

PS: As indicated in the remarks, there are some syntax changes in swift 2 which comes with xcode 7 and iOS9!

Please look at this page

Answer 2

You can use this extensions to improve substringWithRange

Swift 2.3

extension String
{   
    func substringWithRange(start: Int, end: Int) -> String
    {
        if (start < 0 || start > self.characters.count)
        {
            print("start index \(start) out of bounds")
            return ""
        }
        else if end < 0 || end > self.characters.count
        {
            print("end index \(end) out of bounds")
            return ""
        }
        let range = Range(start: self.startIndex.advancedBy(start), end: self.startIndex.advancedBy(end))
        return self.substringWithRange(range)
    }

    func substringWithRange(start: Int, location: Int) -> String
    {
        if (start < 0 || start > self.characters.count)
        {
            print("start index \(start) out of bounds")
            return ""
        }
        else if location < 0 || start + location > self.characters.count
        {
            print("end index \(start + location) out of bounds")
            return ""
        }
        let range = Range(start: self.startIndex.advancedBy(start), end: self.startIndex.advancedBy(start + location))
        return self.substringWithRange(range)
    }
}

Swift 3

extension String
{
    func substring(start: Int, end: Int) -> String
    {
        if (start < 0 || start > self.characters.count)
        {
            print("start index \(start) out of bounds")
            return ""
        }
        else if end < 0 || end > self.characters.count
        {
            print("end index \(end) out of bounds")
            return ""
        }
        let startIndex = self.characters.index(self.startIndex, offsetBy: start)
        let endIndex = self.characters.index(self.startIndex, offsetBy: end)
        let range = startIndex..<endIndex

        return self.substring(with: range)
    }

    func substring(start: Int, location: Int) -> String
    {
        if (start < 0 || start > self.characters.count)
        {
            print("start index \(start) out of bounds")
            return ""
        }
        else if location < 0 || start + location > self.characters.count
        {
            print("end index \(start + location) out of bounds")
            return ""
        }
        let startIndex = self.characters.index(self.startIndex, offsetBy: start)
        let endIndex = self.characters.index(self.startIndex, offsetBy: start + location)
        let range = startIndex..<endIndex

        return self.substring(with: range)
    }
}

Usage:

let str = "Hello, playground"

let substring1 = str.substringWithRange(0, end: 5) //Hello
let substring2 = str.substringWithRange(7, location: 10) //playground

Answer 3

Swift 2

Simple

let str = "My String"
let subStr = str[str.startIndex.advancedBy(3)...str.startIndex.advancedBy(7)]
//"Strin"

Swift 3

let startIndex = str.index(str.startIndex, offsetBy: 3)
let endIndex = str.index(str.startIndex, offsetBy: 7)

str[startIndex...endIndex]       // "Strin"
str.substring(to: startIndex)    // "My "
str.substring(from: startIndex)  // "String"

Swift 4

substring(to:) and substring(from:) are deprecated in Swift 4.

String(str[..<startIndex])    // "My "
String(str[startIndex...])    // "String"
String(str[startIndex...endIndex])    // "Strin"

Answer 4

Rob Napier had already given a awesome answer using subscript. But i felt one drawback in that as there is no check for out of bound conditions. This can tend to crash. So i modified the extension and here it is

extension String {
    subscript (r: Range<Int>) -> String? { //Optional String as return value
        get {
            let stringCount = self.characters.count as Int
            //Check for out of boundary condition
            if (stringCount < r.endIndex) || (stringCount < r.startIndex){
                return nil
            }
            let startIndex = self.startIndex.advancedBy(r.startIndex)

            let endIndex = self.startIndex.advancedBy(r.endIndex - r.startIndex)

            return self[Range(start: startIndex, end: endIndex)]
        }
    }
}

Output below

var str2 = "Hello, World"

var str3 = str2[0...5]
//Hello,
var str4 = str2[0..<5]
//Hello
var str5 = str2[0..<15]
//nil

So i suggest always to check for the if let

if let string = str[0...5]
{
    //Manipulate your string safely
}

Answer 5

In Swift3

For ex: a variable "Duke James Thomas", we need to get "James".

let name = "Duke James Thomas"
let range: Range<String.Index> = name.range(of:"James")!
let lastrange: Range<String.Index> = img.range(of:"Thomas")!
var middlename = name[range.lowerBound..<lstrange.lowerBound]
print (middlename)

Answer 6

You can use any of the substring methods in a Swift String extension I wrote https://bit.ly/JString.

var string = "hello"
var sub = string.substringFrom(3) // or string[3...5]
println(sub)// "lo"