Delete First Character of String If It Is 0

Question

I want to delete the first character of a string, if the first character is a 0. The 0 can be there more than once.

Is there a simple function that checks the first character and deletes it if it is 0?

Right now, I'm trying it with the JS slice() function but it is very awkward.

Accepted Answer

You can remove the first character of a string using substring:

var s1 = "foobar";
var s2 = s1.substring(1);
alert(s2); // shows "oobar"

To remove all 0's at the start of the string:

var s = "0000test";
while(s.charAt(0) === '0')
{
 s = s.substring(1);
}

Answer 2

Very readable code is to use .substring() with a start set to index of the second character (1) (first character has index 0). Second parameter of the .substring() method is actually optional, so you don't even need to call .length()...

TL;DR : Remove first character from the string:

str = str.substring(1);

...yes it is that simple...

Must Read

Removing some particular character(s):

As @Shaded suggested, just loop this while first character of your string is the "unwanted" character...

var yourString = "0000test";
var unwantedCharacter = "0";
//there is really no need for === check, since we use String's charAt()
while( yourString.charAt(0) == unwantedCharacter ) yourString = yourString.substring(1);
//yourString now contains "test"

Delete First Character of String If It Is 0

16 Answers

TL;DR : Remove first character from the string:

Must Read

Removing some particular character(s):

Robert Thorne