My program has to find specific words inside a RichTextBox and change their color (simple syntax highlighter). I am using Regex to find the words.
I'm able to find them all but if my text contains 2 or more of the same word, I can only change the color of the first one, the other ones get untouched.
Dim words As String = "(in|handles|object|sub|private|dim|as|then|if|regex)"
Dim rex As New Regex(words)
Dim mc As MatchCollection = rex.Matches(RichTextBox1.Text.ToLower)
Dim lower_case_text As String = RichTextBox1.Text.ToLower
For Each m As Match In mc
For Each c As Capture In m.Captures
MsgBox(c.Value)
Dim index As Integer = lower_case_text.IndexOf(c.Value)
Dim lenght As Integer = c.Value.Length
RichTextBox1.Select(index, lenght)
RichTextBox1.SelectionColor = Color.Blue
Next
Next
My code needs to run from a button click. I think my problem is in the for each loop, but I'm not sure.
I already have a few versions of it, but none working.
This method can be simplified using some RegexOptions
RegexOptions.Compiled Or RegexOptions.IgnoreCase
RegexOptions.Compiled:
Can be useful if the Text is long (faster execution at the expense of a slower startup).
RegexOptions.IgnoreCase
Performs a case-insensitive matching. You don't need to convert ToLower() the Text.
RegexOptions.CultureInvariant
Could be added when necessary.
See the Regular Expression Options document for more informations.
Also, see the Regex.Escape() method, if parts of the pattern could contain some metacharacters.
Your code can be reduced to:
Dim pattern As String = "in|handles|object|sub|private|dim|as|then|if|regex"
Dim regx As New Regex(pattern, RegexOptions.Compiled Or RegexOptions.IgnoreCase)
Dim matches As MatchCollection = regx.Matches(RichTextBox1.Text)
For Each match As Match In matches
RichTextBox1.Select(match.Index, match.Length)
RichTextBox1.SelectionColor = Color.Blue
Next