ios - What is the most efficient way to count number of word in NSString without using regex?

Question

I am a bit new to Objective C and was wondering if there is a better way to count words in a string.

ie:

NSString *str = @"this is a string";

// return should be 4 words ..

The way I now how to do it is by breaking the string into an array of words space (' ') character and count the array.

Any advise will be appreciated! Thanks!! :)

EDIT: For those of you who came here looking for answer; I found a similar post with an excellent reply.

How to count words within a text string?

Answer 1

There are two ways that don't involve collecting an array of words, and should be smarter than just breaking on spaces:

• NSString's enumerateSubstringsInRange:options:usingBlock: method. Introduced to Cocoa Touch in iOS 4.0.
• CFStringTokenizer.

I would use one of these, even if I did want to collect or otherwise use the words.