Select all instances that meet the search regex

[Ivaylo]

Hi,

I'm using EditPad Pro to process a large HTML file. I need to extract
only part of the text. For this purpose, I do the following regex
search:

<td valign=top>(.*?)</td>

in order to find any text between the opening tag "<td valign=top>"
and the closing tag "</td>".

Now I need either:

1. to copy all the instances that match the search regex string and
copy them to a separate file for further processing

or

2. delete all the text that doesn't match the search regex string.

Can you advise me hot to do this?

Thank you in advance!

[Eugeny Sattler]

On Sun, Jan 11, 2009 at 2:23 AM, Ivaylo <ivanov...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Hi,
>
> I'm using EditPad Pro to process a large HTML file. I need to extract
> only part of the text. For this purpose, I do the following regex
> search:
>
> <td valign=top>(.*?)</td>
>
> in order to find any text between the opening tag "<td valign=top>"
> and the closing tag "</td>".
>
> Now I need either:
>
> 1. to copy all the instances that match the search regex string and
> copy them to a separate file for further processing

For this not EditPad Pro, but PowerGREP is more suitable tool. Use the
same regex <td valign=top>(.*?)</td> and $1 in collect field.
Although it is expensive ($149 single license) but trying PowerGREP is
free. Most likely you will be able to solve your problem already in
trial mode.

> 2. delete all the text that doesn't match the search regex string.

this is far more complex task as you need to write a regex that
matches all the rest.
What i suggest is far from being elegant but still have a look at this:
1) manually delete all text from the beginning of file till first <td
valign = top>
2) manually delete all text after the last <td valign=top>(.*?)</td>
3) cyclically delete all text between two neighbouring <td
valign=top>(.*?)</td>
until you can find nothing....

Here is the regex i suggest for it with comments below it (view in
CourierNew font or the like).

(<td valign=top>(.*?)</td>)(.*?)<td valign=top>
\ / ^
\_________$1__________/ |
|
to be deleted

and replace it with
$1<td valign=top>

Thus actually you will delete the text that was matched by the second
(.*?) in our regular expression

Please report if it worked.

--
Regards,
Eugeny

[Eugeny....@gmail.com]

> and replace it with
> $1 <td valign=top>

^
|_ or put some line breaks here...

in order to visually separate neighbouring <TD>...</TD> tag pairs in
resulting file.

[Ivaylo]

Hi Eugeny,

Thank you for your suggestions.

I found a workaround method: I pasted the html code in MS Word 2003,
then I used the Search function with the following search string:

\<td valign=top\>*\</td\>

Then, I checked the box Sellect All found instances (or something like
that; I don't remember the exact name of this function). Word found
and selected all instances that matched the search string, and then I
copied and pasted them in a separate file.

It turns out that some editors lack this function.

On Jan 11, 9:00 am, "Eugeny Sattler" <eugeny.satt...@gmail.com> wrote:

> Eugeny- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -