Question

IE8 is reporting an Unexpected Quantifier error, with the following JS function, which I want to use to strip certain symbols from a string.

function stripCurrencySymbols(currStr){
  var symbols = [",",'£',"p","$"];
  for(i in symbols){
    currStr = currStr.replace(new RegExp(symbols[i], 'g'),"");
  }
  return currStr;
}

I think it’s because the $ needs to be escaped, I tried replacing it with \$, but to no avail. Any ideas?

Answer 1

It should be "\\$" when you’re constructing a regex from a string.

Also, why not do this:

function stripCurrencySymbols(currStr){
    return currStr.replace(/[,£p$]/g, "");
}

[,£p$] is a character class meaning “one of the included characters”; inside a character class, most metacharacters like $ need not be escaped.