Navindra Umanee wrote:

>Hi,
>
>I have strings of the form:
>
>string='.///root/1068663688//1068824962/1068836207//1068932537///'
>
>Basically, I want to extract the last number in the string.
>
>Right now I'm doing:
>
>string[/(\d*)\/*$/].delete('/')
>
>But I've already matched the digit I want, so the delete is just
>superfluous work.  How can I extract the number without doing a
>separate delete?
>
>Thanks,
>Navin.
>
>
>
>  
>
class String
  def str_replace(what,with)
    re = Regexp.new(Regexp.quote(what))
    self.gsub(re) {with}
  end
 
  def str_ireplace(what,with)
    re = Regexp.new(Regexp.quote(what), Regexp::IGNORECASE)
    self.gsub(re) {with}
  end
end

string='.///root/1068663688//1068824962/1068836207//1068932537///'

string = string.str_replace('///','')
string = string.str_replace('//','/')
temp = string.split('/')
return temp[4]

regards
Eko