In java, the index start from 0. For the example you gave, let's say you created a string like this.

String s = "Welcome to Java";

So, this string has 15 characters in it. If you call below, it will return 15.

s.length()

If you draw a table, it should looks like this:

    -------------------------------------------
    Index     | 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 |
    ------------------------------------------
    character | W | e | l | c | o | m | e |   |
    -------------------------------------------

    ---------------------------------------
    Index     | 8 | 9 | 10| 11| 12| 13| 14|
    ---------------------------------------
    character | t | o |   | J | a | v | a |
    ---------------------------------------

At position 5, since the java start the index with 0, you now know that you have m at position (or index ) at 5, which is 6th character.

    ---------------
    Index     | 5 |
    ---------------
    character | m |
    ---------------

Usually, in java, position and index means same. However, if the person (whoever asked this question to trick you) say "we use the term 'position 5,' (so he meant 5th character in the string as position 5), then you should start the substring at index of 4.

Yes. it is confused. However, when we say position 5, we usually mean the 6th character where index started at 0.

---------------
Index     | 4 |
---------------
character | o |
---------------

Now, let's assume that the person (who asked this question) meant the position 5 as 5th character in the string. Then, you will need to think that, your start index to substring is 4.

So, if the person would like to substring from the nth character in a string (where n is a number between 1 to string length), then you want to start substring at n-1, because, as I said, the index starts at 0, in Java.

Now, let's look at the substring. Here is the documentation about the substring method: https://docs.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/api/java/lang/String.html

Since you would like print a substring of given string, from index 4, you will call...

System.out.println(s.substring(4));

What is the output? "me to Java." ? I this case, the output should be

"ome to Java"

However, if you meant the position 5, same as index 5, then you will call...

System.out.println(s.substring(5));

Which will print

"me to Java"

You can use Regex.

Matcher matcher = Pattern.compile("(state)(\(.*?\))").matcher(text);
String state = matcher.group(2);