Parsing string to array using Regex in c#

Question

im currently making an c# application that receives a string from an serialport, and i need to parse this data so i can do stuff with it.

The strings that are send through the SerialPort are formatted like this:

*NTF,CTRL,SQL,OPEN,+,-66*NTF,CTRL,DBUSY,ON,+,-63*NTF,CTRL,DBUSY,OFF*NTF,CTRL,SQL,CLOSE*

now im wondering how i can split this string into segments on the * symbol, i have made a couple attempts at this myself but couldnt figure it out.

The attempts i made are:

String[] tmp = data.ToString().Split('*');
foreach(String word in tmp)
{
    if (word.Contains(",80") || word.Contains(",81"))
    {
        COM_PORT_INFO_BOX.Text += word + "\r\n";
    }
}

which gave me:

NTF,CTRL,SQL,OPEN,+,-66
NTF,CT RL,DBUSY
,ON,+,-6
3
NTF,CT
RL,DBUSY
,OFF NTF,CT
RL,SQL,C
LOSE

i have also tried:

var regex = new Regex('*'+".+"+'*');
var matches = regex.Matches(data);

But this gave me an error.

What i want to achieve:

The formatted string to look like this:

NTF,CTRL,SQL,OPEN,+,-66
NTF,CTRL,DBUSY,ON,+,-63
NTF,CTRL,DBUSY,OFF
NTF,CTRL,SQL,CLOSE

EDIT:

I have solved the problem by having this piece of code:

SerialPort sp = (SerialPort)sender;
data += sp.ReadExisting().ToString();
string[] tmp = data.Split(new char[] {'\u0002','\u0003'}, StringSplitOptions.RemoveEmptyEntries);
foreach (string line in tmp)
{
    if (line.Contains(",80") || line.Contains(",81") || line.Contains(",RXVCALL"))
    {
        COM_PORT_INFO_BOX.Text += line.Substring(1) + "\r\n";
        data = "";
    }
}          

Answer 1

I know you said "preferrably with regex" but this is cleaner IMHO with String.Split:

string s = "*blablablab,blablabla,blablabla,blablabla*blablabla,blabalbal,blablabla*";
string[] results = s.Split(new [] {'*'}, StringSplitOptions.RemoveEmptyEntries);

results:

String[] (2 items)
----------------------------
blablablab,blablabla,blablabla,blablabla 
blablabla,blabalbal,blablabla 

One thing to remember with String.Split is that is your string begins or ends with a delimiter you'll get empty entries at the beginning and end, respectively, of the resulting array. Adding the StringSplitOptions.RemoveEmptyEntries parameter removes those empty entries so you are just left with the two stings between each pair of asterisks.