Question

need help with an expression

Asked by: VFM-Tech

I'm trying to strip down this code so the result is CHROME SALON... I need to get rid of everything else including tabs, whitespaces etc... I've been fooling around with some reg ex but I'm really new to this and it's driving me crazy... I figured out how to do everything seperatly but I'm not sure how to group those together so in one pass it will strip everything out... can you help me out and please explain how you constructed the regex... thanks a lot:

      <td class="lName" colspan="2">
                                                            
                                                            CHROME SALON
                                                      </td>
                                                      <td class="lPhone" align="right">

my reg ex: (<td\sclass="lName"\scolspan="2">)(\s*\t)(</td>)

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Asked On
2005-09-20 at 20:19:59ID21568568
Tags

reg

,

expression

,

ex

Topic

Java Programming Language

Participating Experts
3
Points
500
Comments
6

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Answers

 

by: dbkrugerPosted on 2005-09-20 at 21:27:03ID: 14925705

You want to find the tag <td class=....> , skip the space, and remember the text.

Your first part is right, but ditch the parens. They are only necessary if you want to remember that part of the pattern.

<td\sclass="lName"\scolspan="2">

I would generalize this slightly in case there are more than one space (perfectly legal).

<td\s+class="lName"\s+colspan="2">

Then you skip optional spaces. That's when things get nutty. You then want to remember the word, but instead you put in a tab \t, which has already been matched by the \s, guaranteeing failure. I'm going to keep it simple by going until the first angle bracket -- ie <

<td\s+class="lName"\s+colspan="2">\s*([^<]*)

This would, frankly do it. but you can throw on the stuff afterward if you want. Don't put more than you have to, or you will end up eliminating things you didn't think about. Complicated patterns are confusing, as you've learned!

<td\s+class="lName"\s+colspan="2">\s*([^<]*)</td>\s*<td class="lPhone" align="right">



 

by: ksivananthPosted on 2005-09-20 at 21:58:35ID: 14925794

I will suggest to use a HTML parser instead of regex!

 

by: profiles_arunPosted on 2005-09-21 at 06:05:38ID: 14927812

Since html code wouldnot be consistent... i'll suggest you'll have to parse it
may be  HTTPUNIT    can be better option for that.

regards,
AKS

 

by: ksivananthPosted on 2005-09-21 at 06:07:49ID: 14927831

how about the parser comes with java text package?

20120131-EE-VQP-002

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