RegeributedTextView is a subclass of UITextView that supports fully attribute string based on regular expression.

import RegeributedTextView

and you can use RegeributedTextView as subclass of UITextView in Interface Builder.

It is simple to use an attribute string.

Chage the text color:

textView.addAttribute(.all, attribute: .textColor(.red)))

Instead of .all, you can use regular expression .

textView.addAttribute(".*", attribute: .textColor(.red)))

If you want highlight a mention and hash tag like a SNS, you can use following parameters.

textView.addAttribute(.mention, attribute: .bold))
textView.addAttribute(.hashTag, attribute: .textColor(.blue)))

In swift 3, The property linkTextAttributes of UITextView can designate the link text behavior but it is not possible to coloring a few text separately in the same text. In this case, you can use attributes text based on regular expression like this.

e.g. Set text color separately.

textView.addAttribute("@[a-zA-Z0-9]+", attributes: [.textColor(.black), .bold], values: ["Type": "Mention"])
textView.addAttribute("#[a-zA-Z0-9]+", attribute: .textColor(.blue), values: ["Type": "HashTag"])

In RegeributedTextView, All attributed text can be detected for each word by tapping. and you can detect a tap event of link text by RegeributedTextViewDelegate. The arguments of values can embbed any values.

func regeributedTextView(_ textView: RegeributedTextView, didSelect text: String, values: [String : Any]) {
    print("Selected word: \(text)")
    if let url = values["Type"] as? String {
        // Do something
    }

public func addAttribute(_ regexString: String, attribute: TextAttribute, values: [String: Any] = [:], priority: Priority = .medium, applyingIndex: ApplyingIndex = .all)

To control an attribute text, you can use Prioriry and ApplyingIndex. Priority represents that attribute string priority. Attribute text range is sometime overlaped, so this property enable to control attribute string priority like AutoLayout.

Rules:

• The new attribute priority is greater than the current attribute, it's overwriten.
• The new attribute priority is less than the current attribute, it's ignored.

Applying Index represents which text should be applied an attribute because it is difficult to control the attribute text order using only regular expression.

e.g. Applying only first element

let userName = "rinov"
textView.addAttribute(userName, attribute: .bold, applyingIndex: .first)

ApplyingIndex is available following patterns.

XCode 8+ Swift 3+

Cocoapods:

$: pod repo update

pod "RegeributedTextView"

and

$: pod install

or

Carthage:

github "rinov/RegeributedTextView"

and

$: carthage update --platform iOS

rinov, [email protected]

RegeributedTextView is available under the MIT license. See the LICENSE file for more info.