Count character ocurrences in a string in MSBuild

Question

What's the easiest way to count the number of times a character ('\' in my case) appears in a string using MSBuild? I tried using Split(\) to no avail.

Answer 1

MsBuild 4.0 allows the use of property functions http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd633440.aspx

You can use this to split the string. You must then substract the length by 1 to get the occurrence count.

<Target Name="SplitCount">
    <PropertyGroup>
        <path>test\document\home</path>
    </PropertyGroup>

    <PropertyGroup>
        <test>$(path.Split('\').length)</test>
    </PropertyGroup>

    <Message Text="occurrence count: $([MSBuild]::Subtract($(test), 1))"><Message>        
</Target>

Answer 2

In the MSBuild Community Tasks, there is a RegexMatch task that would give you a list, which you could then count perhaps.

Another option would be to write your own custom task. Then add a bit of Linq like so:

string input = "This \\ is \\ a \\ test";
var items = (from c in input where c == '\\' select c).ToList();
var count = items.Count;