Module:String2/doc

The module String2 contains five case-related calls that convert strings to upper, lower, sentence or title case and two calls that are useful for working with substrings. There are two utility calls that strip leading zeros from padded numbers and transform text so that it is not interpreted as wikitext.

Functions

upper

The upper function simply converts all characters to upper case.

lower

The lower function simply converts all characters to lower case.

title

The title function capitalises the first letter of each word in the text, apart from a number of short words recommended by The U.S. Government Printing Office Style Manual: a, an, the, at, by, for, in, of, on, to, up, and, as, but, or, and nor.

sentence

The sentence function finds the first letter and capitalises it, then renders the rest of the text in lower case. It works properly with text containing wiki-markup. Compare {{#invoke:String2|sentence|[[action game]]}} -> Action game with {{ucfirst:{{lc:[[action game]]}}}} -> action game. Piped wiki-links are handled as well:

• {{#invoke:String2|sentence|[[trimix (breathing gas)|trimix]]}} -> Trimix

So are lists:

• {{#invoke:String2 |sentence |{{hlist ||[[apples]] |[[pears]] |[[oranges]]}}}} →
  • Apples
  • pears
  • oranges

ucfirst

The ucfirst function is similar to sentence; it renders the first alphabetical character in upper case, but leaves the capitalisation of the rest of the text unaltered. This is useful if the text contains proper nouns, but it will not regularise sentences that are ALLCAPS, for example. It also works with text containing piped wiki-links and with html lists. label is an alias to this function for backward compatibility.(now obselete)

posnq

• posnq (position, no quotes) returns the numerical start position of the first occurrence of one piece of text ("match") inside another ("str").
• It returns nil if no match is found, or if either parameter is blank.
• It takes the text to be searched in as the first unnamed parameter, which is trimmed.
• It takes the text to match as the second unnamed parameter, which is trimmed and any double quotes " are stripped out. That allows spaces at the beginning or end of the match string to be included in a consistent manner.

split

The split function splits text at boundaries specified by separator and returns the chunk for the index idx (starting at 1). It can use positional parameters or named parameters (but these should not be mixed):

• {{#invoke:String2 |split |text |separator |index |true/false}}
• {{#invoke:String2 |split |txt=text |sep=separator |idx=index |plain=true/false}}

Any double quotes (") in the separator parameter are stripped out, which allows spaces and wikitext like ["[ to be passed. Use {{!}} for the pipe character |.

If the optional plain parameter is set to false / no / 0 then separator is treated as a Lua pattern. The default is plain=true, i.e. normal text matching.

The index parameter is optional; it defaults to the first chunk of text.

The Template:Stringsplit is a convenience wrapper for the split function.

stripZeros

The stripZeros functions finds the first number in a string of text and strips leading zeros, but retains a zero which is followed by a decimal point. For example: "0940" -> "940"; "Year: 0023" -> "Year: 23"; "00.12" -> "0.12"

nowiki

The nowiki function ensures that a string of text is treated by the MediaWiki software as just a string, not code. It trims leading and trailing whitespace.

val2percent

The val2percent functions scans through a string, passed as either the first unnamed parameter or |txt=, and converts each number it finds into a percentage, then returns the resulting string.

one2a

The one2a function scans through a string, passed as either the first unnamed parameter or |txt=, and converts each occurrence of 'one ' into either 'a ' or 'an ', then returns the resultant string.

The Template:One2a is a convenience wrapper for the one2a function.

Usage

• {{#invoke:String2 | upper |…}} - Shifts all characters to uppercase
• {{#invoke:String2 | lower |…}} - Shifts all characters to lowercase
• {{#invoke:String2 | sentence |…}} - Capitalizes the first character and shifts the rest to lowercase
  • Although similar to magic words' {{ucfirst:}} function, this call works even with piped wiki-links because it searches beyond leading brackets and other non-alphanumeric characters.
  • It now also recognises when it has an html list passed to it and capitalises the first alphabetic letter beyond the list item markup (‎<li>) and any piped links that may be there.
• {{#invoke:String2 | ucfirst |…}} - Capitalizes the first alphabetic character and leaves the rest unaltered
  • Works with piped wiki-links and html lists
• {{#invoke:String2 | title |…}} - Capitalizes all words, except for a, an, the, at, by, for, in, of, on, to, up, and, as, but, or, and nor.
• {{#invoke:String2 | stripZeros |…}} - Removes leading padding zeros from the first number it finds in the string
• {{#invoke:String2 | title |…}} - Renders the string as plain text without wikicode

Parameters

These functions take one unnamed parameter comprising (or invoking as a string) the text to be manipulated:

• upper
• lower
• title
• sentence
• ucfirst

Examples

Input	Output
{{#invoke:String2| upper | abcd }}
{{#invoke:String2| upper | abCD }}
{{#invoke:String2| upper | ABcd }}
{{#invoke:String2| upper | ABCD }}
{{#invoke:String2| upper | }}
{{#invoke:String2| lower | abcd }}
{{#invoke:String2| lower | abCD }}
{{#invoke:String2| lower | ABcd }}
{{#invoke:String2| lower | ABCD }}
{{#invoke:String2| lower | }}
{{#invoke:String2| ucfirst | abcd }}	Abcd
{{#invoke:String2| ucfirst | abCD }}	AbCD
{{#invoke:String2| ucfirst | ABcd }}	ABcd
{{#invoke:String2| ucfirst | ABCD }}	ABCD
{{#invoke:String2| ucfirst | 123abcd }}	123abcd
{{#invoke:String2| ucfirst | }}
{{#invoke:String2| ucfirst | human X chromosome }}	Human X chromosome
{{#invoke:String2| sentence | abcd }}	Abcd
{{#invoke:String2| sentence | abCD }}	Abcd
{{#invoke:String2| sentence | ABcd }}	Abcd
{{#invoke:String2| sentence | ABCD }}	Abcd
{{#invoke:String2| sentence | [[action game]] }}	Action game
{{#invoke:String2| sentence | [[trimix (breathing gas)|trimix]] }}	Trimix
{{#invoke:String2 | sentence | {{#invoke:WikidataIB |getValue |P136 |fetchwikidata=ALL |onlysourced=no |qid=Q1396889}} }}
{{#invoke:String2 | sentence | {{#invoke:WikidataIB |getValue |P106 |fetchwikidata=ALL |list=hlist |qid=Q453196}} }}
{{#invoke:String2| sentence | }}
{{#invoke:String2| title | abcd }}	Abcd
{{#invoke:String2| title | abCD }}	Abcd
{{#invoke:String2| title | ABcd }}	Abcd
{{#invoke:String2| title | ABCD }}	Abcd
{{#invoke:String2| title | }}
{{#invoke:String2| title | the vitamins are in my fresh california raisins}}	The Vitamins Are in My Fresh California Raisins

Posnq

Template:Posnq is a convenience wrapper for the posnq function.

• {{Posnq |This is a piece of text to be searched |piece of }} →
• {{Posnq |This is a piece oftext to be searched |piece of }} →
• {{Posnq |This is a piece of text to be searched |"piece of "}} →
• {{Posnq |This is a piece oftext to be searched |"piece of "}} →

Stringsplit

Template:Stringsplit is a convenience wrapper for the split function.

• {{Stringsplit |This is a piece of text to be split |" "}} → This
• {{Stringsplit |This is a piece of text to be split |" "| 4}} → piece
• {{Stringsplit |This is a piece of text to be split |x| 2}} → t to be split

Modules may return strings with | as separators like this: {{#invoke:carousel | main | name = WPDogs | switchsecs = 5 }} → סאטף אנגלי.jpg | Staffordshire Bull Terrier

• {{Stringsplit |{{#invoke:carousel | main | name = WPDogs | switchsecs = 5 }}|{{!}}| 2}} → Staffordshire Bull Terrier

Lua patterns can allow splitting at classes of characters such as punctuation:

• {{Stringsplit |Apples, pears, oranges; Cats, dogs|"%p"| 2 |false}} → pears
• {{Stringsplit |Apples, pears, oranges; Cats, dogs|"%p"| 4 |false}} → Cats

Or split on anything that isn't a letter (no is treated as false):

• {{Stringsplit |Apples pears oranges; Cats dogs|"%A+"| 4 |no}} → Cats

Named parameters force the trimming of leading and trailing spaces in the parameters and are generally clearer when used:

• {{Stringsplit | txt=Apples pears oranges; Cats dogs | sep="%A+" | idx=3 | plain=false }} → oranges

One2a

Template:One2a is a convenience wrapper for the one2a function.

Capitalisation is kept. Aimed for usage with {{Convert}}.

• {{one2a |One foot. One mile. One kilometer. One inch.One amp. one foot. one mile. one inch. Alone at last. Onely the lonely. ONE ounce. One monkey.}} →

A foot. A mile. A kilometer. An inch.An amp. a foot. a mile. an inch. Alone at last. Onely the lonely. ONE ounce. A monkey.

• {{convert|1|ft|spell=on}} → one foot (zero point three zero metres)
• {{one2a|{{convert|1|ft|spell=on}}}} → a foot (zero point three zero metres)
• {{convert|2.54|cm|0|disp=out|spell=on}} → one inch
• {{one2a|{{convert|2.54|cm|0|disp=out|spell=on}}}} → an inch

See also

Module:String for the following functions:

• len
• sub
• sublength
• match
• pos
• str_find
• find
• replace
• rep

Other templates

• {{Fixcaps}} – capitalizes or lowercases words (mostly used to repair paragraphs written by new editors in all-caps or all-lowercase {{fixcaps|pLAy/tHE/GamE}} → Play the Game
• {{Capitalization}} – banner-style template indicating an article needs capitalization cleanup
• {{R from other capitalisation}} – for categorizing WP:Redirects from titles to article (or other pages) where the redirect is just a different capitalization
• {{Template capitalization}} – ??
• Module:String2

Magic words that rewrite the output (copy-paste will get the text as displayed, not as entered):

• {{lc:}} – lower case output of the full text
• {{uc:}} – upper case output of the full text
• {{lcfirst:}} – lower case output of the first character only
• {{ucfirst:}} – upper case output of the first character only