Before

before returns the part of a string before the first occurrence of a separator.

Overview

Use before when you want the text that appears before a marker:

filename | "adventure.gbln"
name | filename.before(".")

:say(name)  /// adventure

filename | "adventure.gbln"
name | filename.before(".")

:say(name)  /// adventure

The separator itself is not included in the result.

Method Style

Call before as a method on the string you want to search:

location | "caves/armory/chest"
first_area | location.before("/")

:say(first_area)  /// caves

location | "caves/armory/chest"
first_area | location.before("/")

:say(first_area)  /// caves

The equivalent free-call form is:

first_area | before("caves/armory/chest", "/")

first_area | before("caves/armory/chest", "/")

Both forms behave the same way.

First Occurrence

before stops at the first occurrence of the separator:

route | "caves/upper/armory"

route.before("/")  /// caves

route | "caves/upper/armory"

route.before("/")  /// caves

Use Before Last when you want everything before the final occurrence instead:

before(route, "/")       /// caves
before_last(route, "/")  /// caves/upper

before(route, "/")       /// caves
before_last(route, "/")  /// caves/upper

Missing Separator

If the separator does not appear, before returns the original string:

before("entrance.gbln", "/")  /// entrance.gbln

before("entrance.gbln", "/")  /// entrance.gbln

This means the result is never empty merely because the separator was not found.

Empty Separator

An empty separator is found at the beginning of every string, so the result is an empty string:

before("adventure", "")  /// ""

before("adventure", "")  /// ""

Signature

string.before(separator)
before(string, separator)

string.before(separator)
before(string, separator)

before returns a string.

Errors

before requires a string and a separator:

before("maps/caves/entrance.gbln")
/// error: R0301 wrong-arity

before("maps/caves/entrance.gbln")
/// error: R0301 wrong-arity

Both values must be strings:

before("maps/caves/entrance.gbln", 2)
/// error: T0205 type-mismatch

before("maps/caves/entrance.gbln", 2)
/// error: T0205 type-mismatch