remove empty lines from an array

[maork70838979]

Hi everyone

im trying to make a script that splits text into individual lines,

then duplicates a comp according to the number of lines and replaces the text in each comp (one line in each comp)

ive done the splitting part and its working fine

but i want to get rid of blank lines so i wont get a comp with an empty text layer.

turn this-

1

2

3

4

into-

1

2

3

4

heres my function

function makesupers() {

      app.beginUndoGroup("SUPER MASTER");

            var myComp;

                for (var i = 1; i <= app.project.numItems; i ++) {

                    if ((app.project.item(i) instanceof CompItem) && (app.project.item(i).name === 'Name Super')) {

                        var myComp = app.project.item(i);

                        var text = myPanel.grp.groupOne.Text1.text;

                        var lines = text.split(/[\n\r]/);

                            for (var l = 0; l<= lines.length; l++){

        myComp.layer("TEXT").property("ADBE Text Properties").property("ADBE Text Document").setValue(lines);

              myComp.duplicate();

              }

        break;

        app.endUndoGroup();

i tried using the .replace() method but i cant get it to work after the.split function

any suggestions?

Thanks!!

[Theodoros Tziatzios]

Try inserting the following replace command after the var text = myPanel.grp.groupOne.Text1.text; line

text = text.replace(/(\r\n|\n|\r)/gm,"");

and then you can simplify the split command to this:

var lines = text.split(" ");

Cheers!

[maork70838979]

Hi TheodorosGR,

thanks for your reply!!

unfortunately this doesnt work for me ..

the empty lines are erased,

but it makes a one long line of text..

i think this is because i need to first split the text to lines and then check for the blank ones

otherwise it unifies the lines because there are no spaces due to .replace

[Theodoros Tziatzios]

So let's go through it step-by-step.

The .split command uses a separator (in our case we use the space " ") to split a string into an array of substrings.

Is you run the code below you will get an alert window that shows "4".

var myText = "this is a test";
var lines = myText.split(" ");
alert(lines.length);

Now, that in theory should solve your problem, but I noticed that you are trying to read \r - carriage returns and \n - line feeds in your regex function.

This leads me to believe that your myPanel.grp.groupOne.Text1.text; somehow contains these types of characters and these are the characters that give you the extra empty lines.

So by striping away the carriage returns and the line feeds you end up with a "clean" string that the split command can use.

Can you please try the code below, inside you script, and report back the result?

var text = myPanel.grp.groupOne.Text1.text;
text = text.replace(/(\r\n|\n|\r)/gm,"");
var lines = text.split(" ");
alert(lines.length);

Cheers.

[maork70838979]

It returns “1” .. i still get one line with all the text

i will try to explain myself a bit better

Im copying text from outside source into ae textarea.

the text copied includes the empty lines

which im trying to get rid of.

my text looks something like-

name last name, manager

another name, designer

and so on.. so im seperating this text into lines so i get each name in one comp with .split /r /n so it splits by line breaks (enter key) and it works great except for the lines that turn into a comp with empty text layer..

thats what im trying to solve

thank you very much for the help! Much appreciated!

[Paul Tuersley · Accepted solution]

Don't you just need something like this in your second for loop?

i.e. if lines isn't blank, do stuff

if (lines != "") {

[maork70838979]

So simple!! It worked!!

thank you both so much!

[Theodoros Tziatzios]

Can you please try this, I've changed the 2nd line from this /gm,"" to this /gm," "

var text = myPanel.grp.groupOne.Text1.text; 
text = text.replace(/(\r\n|\n|\r)/gm," "); 
var lines = text.split(" "); 
alert(lines.length);