Module `Caml.String`

String operations.

A string is an immutable data structure that contains a fixed-length sequence of (single-byte) characters. Each character can be accessed in constant time through its index.

Given a string s of length l, we can access each of the l characters of s via its index in the sequence. Indexes start at 0, and we will call an index valid in s if it falls within the range [0...l-1] (inclusive). A position is the point between two characters or at the beginning or end of the string. We call a position valid in s if it falls within the range [0...l] (inclusive). Note that the character at index n is between positions n and n+1.

Two parameters start and len are said to designate a valid substring of s if len >= 0 and start and start+len are valid positions in s.

Note: OCaml strings used to be modifiable in place, for instance via the String.set and String.blit functions described below. This usage is only possible when the compiler is put in "unsafe-string" mode by giving the -unsafe-string command-line option. This compatibility mode makes the types string and bytes (see module Bytes) interchangeable so that functions expecting byte sequences can also accept strings as arguments and modify them.

The distinction between bytes and string was introduced in OCaml 4.02, and the "unsafe-string" compatibility mode was the default until OCaml 4.05. Starting with 4.06, the compatibility mode is opt-in; we intend to remove the option in the future.

val length : string -> int: Return the length (number of characters) of the given string.

val get : string -> int -> char

String.get s n returns the character at index n in string s. You can also write s.[n] instead of String.get s n.

Raise Invalid_argument if n not a valid index in s.

val set : bytes -> int -> char -> unit

String.set s n c modifies byte sequence s in place, replacing the byte at index n with c. You can also write s.[n] <- c instead of String.set s n c.

Raise Invalid_argument if n is not a valid index in s.

deprecated: This is a deprecated alias of Bytes.set.

val create : int -> bytes

String.create n returns a fresh byte sequence of length n. The sequence is uninitialized and contains arbitrary bytes.

Raise Invalid_argument if n < 0 or n > Sys.max_string_length.

deprecated: This is a deprecated alias of Bytes.create.

val make : int -> char -> string

String.make n c returns a fresh string of length n, filled with the character c.

Raise Invalid_argument if n < 0 or n > Sys.max_string_length.

val init : int -> (int -> char) -> string

String.init n f returns a string of length n, with character i initialized to the result of f i (called in increasing index order).

Raise Invalid_argument if n < 0 or n > Sys.max_string_length.

since: 4.02.0

val copy : string -> string

Return a copy of the given string.

deprecated: Because strings are immutable, it doesn't make much sense to make identical copies of them.

val sub : string -> int -> int -> string

String.sub s start len returns a fresh string of length len, containing the substring of s that starts at position start and has length len.

Raise Invalid_argument if start and len do not designate a valid substring of s.

val fill : bytes -> int -> int -> char -> unit

String.fill s start len c modifies byte sequence s in place, replacing len bytes with c, starting at start.

Raise Invalid_argument if start and len do not designate a valid range of s.

deprecated: This is a deprecated alias of Bytes.fill.

val blit : string -> int -> bytes -> int -> int -> unit: Same as Bytes.blit_string.

val concat : string -> string list -> string

String.concat sep sl concatenates the list of strings sl, inserting the separator string sep between each.

Raise Invalid_argument if the result is longer than Sys.max_string_length bytes.

val iter : (char -> unit) -> string -> unit: String.iter f s applies function f in turn to all the characters of s. It is equivalent to f s.[0]; f s.[1]; ...; f s.[String.length s - 1]; ().

val iteri : (int -> char -> unit) -> string -> unit

Same as String.iter, but the function is applied to the index of the element as first argument (counting from 0), and the character itself as second argument.

since: 4.00.0

val map : (char -> char) -> string -> string

String.map f s applies function f in turn to all the characters of s (in increasing index order) and stores the results in a new string that is returned.

since: 4.00.0

val mapi : (int -> char -> char) -> string -> string

String.mapi f s calls f with each character of s and its index (in increasing index order) and stores the results in a new string that is returned.

since: 4.02.0

val trim : string -> string

Return a copy of the argument, without leading and trailing whitespace. The characters regarded as whitespace are: ' ', '\012', '\n', '\r', and '\t'. If there is neither leading nor trailing whitespace character in the argument, return the original string itself, not a copy.

since: 4.00.0

val escaped : string -> string

Return a copy of the argument, with special characters represented by escape sequences, following the lexical conventions of OCaml. All characters outside the ASCII printable range (32..126) are escaped, as well as backslash and double-quote.

If there is no special character in the argument that needs escaping, return the original string itself, not a copy.

Raise Invalid_argument if the result is longer than Sys.max_string_length bytes.

The function Scanf.unescaped is a left inverse of escaped, i.e. Scanf.unescaped (escaped s) = s for any string s (unless escape s fails).

val index : string -> char -> int

String.index s c returns the index of the first occurrence of character c in string s.

Raise Not_found if c does not occur in s.

val index_opt : string -> char -> int option

String.index_opt s c returns the index of the first occurrence of character c in string s, or None if c does not occur in s.

since: 4.05

val rindex : string -> char -> int

String.rindex s c returns the index of the last occurrence of character c in string s.

Raise Not_found if c does not occur in s.

val rindex_opt : string -> char -> int option

String.rindex_opt s c returns the index of the last occurrence of character c in string s, or None if c does not occur in s.

since: 4.05

val index_from : string -> int -> char -> int

String.index_from s i c returns the index of the first occurrence of character c in string s after position i. String.index s c is equivalent to String.index_from s 0 c.

Raise Invalid_argument if i is not a valid position in s. Raise Not_found if c does not occur in s after position i.

val index_from_opt : string -> int -> char -> int option

String.index_from_opt s i c returns the index of the first occurrence of character c in string s after position i or None if c does not occur in s after position i.

String.index_opt s c is equivalent to String.index_from_opt s 0 c. Raise Invalid_argument if i is not a valid position in s.

since: 4.05

val rindex_from : string -> int -> char -> int

String.rindex_from s i c returns the index of the last occurrence of character c in string s before position i+1. String.rindex s c is equivalent to String.rindex_from s (String.length s - 1) c.

Raise Invalid_argument if i+1 is not a valid position in s. Raise Not_found if c does not occur in s before position i+1.

val rindex_from_opt : string -> int -> char -> int option

String.rindex_from_opt s i c returns the index of the last occurrence of character c in string s before position i+1 or None if c does not occur in s before position i+1.

String.rindex_opt s c is equivalent to String.rindex_from_opt s (String.length s - 1) c.

Raise Invalid_argument if i+1 is not a valid position in s.

since: 4.05

val contains : string -> char -> bool: String.contains s c tests if character c appears in the string s.

val contains_from : string -> int -> char -> bool

String.contains_from s start c tests if character c appears in s after position start. String.contains s c is equivalent to String.contains_from s 0 c.

Raise Invalid_argument if start is not a valid position in s.

val rcontains_from : string -> int -> char -> bool

String.rcontains_from s stop c tests if character c appears in s before position stop+1.

Raise Invalid_argument if stop < 0 or stop+1 is not a valid position in s.

val uppercase : string -> string

Return a copy of the argument, with all lowercase letters translated to uppercase, including accented letters of the ISO Latin-1 (8859-1) character set.

deprecated: Functions operating on Latin-1 character set are deprecated.

val lowercase : string -> string

Return a copy of the argument, with all uppercase letters translated to lowercase, including accented letters of the ISO Latin-1 (8859-1) character set.

deprecated: Functions operating on Latin-1 character set are deprecated.

val capitalize : string -> string

Return a copy of the argument, with the first character set to uppercase, using the ISO Latin-1 (8859-1) character set..

deprecated: Functions operating on Latin-1 character set are deprecated.

val uncapitalize : string -> string

Return a copy of the argument, with the first character set to lowercase, using the ISO Latin-1 (8859-1) character set..

deprecated: Functions operating on Latin-1 character set are deprecated.

val uppercase_ascii : string -> string

Return a copy of the argument, with all lowercase letters translated to uppercase, using the US-ASCII character set.

since: 4.03.0

val lowercase_ascii : string -> string

Return a copy of the argument, with all uppercase letters translated to lowercase, using the US-ASCII character set.

since: 4.03.0

val capitalize_ascii : string -> string

Return a copy of the argument, with the first character set to uppercase, using the US-ASCII character set.

since: 4.03.0

val uncapitalize_ascii : string -> string

Return a copy of the argument, with the first character set to lowercase, using the US-ASCII character set.

since: 4.03.0

type t = string: An alias for the type of strings.

val compare : t -> t -> int: The comparison function for strings, with the same specification as Stdlib.compare. Along with the type t, this function compare allows the module String to be passed as argument to the functors Set.Make and Map.Make.

val equal : t -> t -> bool

The equal function for strings.

since: 4.03.0

val split_on_char : char -> string -> string list

String.split_on_char sep s returns the list of all (possibly empty) substrings of s that are delimited by the sep character.

The function's output is specified by the following invariants:

The list is not empty.
Concatenating its elements using sep as a separator returns a string equal to the input (String.concat (String.make 1 sep) (String.split_on_char sep s) = s).
No string in the result contains the sep character.

since: 4.04.0

Iterators

val to_seq : t -> char Seq.t

Iterate on the string, in increasing index order. Modifications of the string during iteration will be reflected in the iterator.

since: 4.07

val to_seqi : t -> (int * char) Seq.t

Iterate on the string, in increasing order, yielding indices along chars

since: 4.07

val of_seq : char Seq.t -> t

Create a string from the generator

since: 4.07