javascript - Regex to match only comma's but not inside multiple parentheses

Question

Okay, i have this case where comma are inside parenthesis, I want to match the commas that are only outside the parenthesis.

Input : color-stop(50%,rgb(0,0,0)), color-stop(51%,rgb(0,0,0)), color-stop(100%,rgb(0,0,0)))

Output(i'm looking for):color-stop(50%,rgb(0,0,0))**,** color-stop(51%,rgb(0,0,0))**,** color-stop(100%,rgb(0,0,0)))

And this is my regex:-

/(?![^(]*)),/g

The sad part is, it doesn't work when there is a multiple parenthesis :(

Regex

Answer 1

Here is the regex which works perfectly for your input.

,(?![^()]*(?:([^()]*))?))

DEMO

Explanation:

,                        ','
(?!                     negative look ahead, to see if there is not:
  [^()]*                   any character except: '(', ')' (0 or
                           more times)
  (?:                      group, but do not capture (optional):
    (                       '('
    [^()]*                   any character except: '(', ')' (0 or
                             more times)
    )                       ')'
  )?                       end of grouping, ? after the non-capturing group makes the
                           whole non-capturing group as optional.
  )                       ')'
)                        end of look-ahead

Limitations:

This regex works based on the assumption that parentheses will not be nested at a depth greater than 2, i.e. paren within paren. It could also fail if unbalanced, escaped, or quoted parentheses occur in the input, because it relies on the assumption that each closing paren corresponds to an opening paren and vice versa.