Change all indices of a word in a string to '*'.

What is the best method to change all indices of a certain word in a string to '*'.

Like if my string were 'Hello, my name is bob, my age is 43.' And I want to change bob and age so it outputs 'Hello, my name is ***, my *** is 43.'

Answer 1

[Guillaume]

Use strrep or regexprep:

str = 'Hello, my name is bob, my age is 43.';

regexprep(str, 'bob|age', '***')

[Joseph Cheng]

to expand on Guillaume's answer, since names are probably not going to stay 3 char long.

you can get the position and items using regexp:

filters = {'bob'; 'age'}';
teststr = 'Hello, my name is bob, my age is 43.';

regpattern = sprintf(strjoin(filters, '|'));
matches = regexp(teststr, regpattern, 'match')
pos= regexp(teststr, regpattern)

then knowing what was matched and where the positions are you can replace those index positions with "*".