I want to remove static text from string - iOS - ios

Question

Hi I have a News Reader and I keep getting a string like this -
two New York police officers shot dead in 'ambush'
I want the string two New York police officers shot dead in ambush
How can I scan from & to ; and then delete occurrences of the scan.
I created a scanner like so -
NSString *webString222222 = filteredTitle2;
NSScanner *stringScanner222222 = [NSScanner scannerWithString:webString222222];
NSString *content222222 = [[NSString alloc] init];
[stringScanner222222 scanUpToString:#"&" intoString:Nil];
[stringScanner222222 scanUpToString:#";" intoString:&content222222];
NSString *filteredTitle222 = [content222222 stringByReplacingOccurrencesOfString:content222222 withString:#""];
NSString *filteredTitle22 = [filteredTitle222 stringByReplacingOccurrencesOfString:#"&" withString:#""];
But when I do this code the whole text disappears! Every single word.
When I check the title in my NSLog that is the only & sign in there and the only ; sign in there!
Im not sure where I went wrong here.

Answer 1

If the special characters you are encountering are all relatively consistent you can merely replace each of those substrings with the empty string, like so:
NSString *cleansedString = [filteredTitle2 stringByReplacingOccurrencesOfString:#"'"
withString:#""];

Answer 2

You can use NSRegularExpression to build proper matching pattern:
NSString *pattern = #"\\&#[0-9]+;";
NSString *str = #"two New York police officers shot dead in 'ambush'";
NSLog(#"Original test: %#",str);
NSError *error = nil;
NSRegularExpression *regex = [NSRegularExpression
regularExpressionWithPattern:pattern
options:NSRegularExpressionCaseInsensitive error:&error];
if (error != nil)
{
NSLog(#"ERror: %#",error);
}
else
{
NSString *replaced = [regex stringByReplacingMatchesInString:str
options:0
range:NSMakeRange(0, [str length])
withTemplate:#""];
NSLog(#"Replaced test: %#",replaced);
}
See https://developer.apple.com/library/ios/documentation/Foundation/Reference/NSRegularExpression_Class/index.html