JAVASCRIPT
Normalize Whitespace: Replace Multiple Spaces
Learn to clean up user input or text content by using a simple JavaScript regex to replace consecutive whitespace characters with a single space.
function normalizeWhitespace(text) {
// Replaces one or more whitespace characters (including spaces, tabs, newlines)
// with a single space, then trims leading/trailing spaces.
return text.replace(/\s+/g, ' ').trim();
}
const messyText = " Hello world!
This text has too much \t whitespace. ";
console.log("Original text:");
console.log(`"${messyText}"`);
console.log("Normalized text:");
console.log(`"${normalizeWhitespace(messyText)}"`);
const simpleText = "One two three.";
console.log(`"${normalizeWhitespace(simpleText)}"`);
How it works: This JavaScript function `normalizeWhitespace` takes a string and cleans it by replacing all occurrences of one or more consecutive whitespace characters (including spaces, tabs, and newlines) with a single space. The `\s+` regex matches one or more whitespace characters, and the `g` flag ensures a global replacement. Finally, `trim()` is called to remove any leading or trailing spaces that might result from the replacement.