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POHow can I efficiently handle multiple Perl search/replace operations on the same string?
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  1. POHow can I efficiently handle multiple Perl search/replace operations on the same string?
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    copied!<p>So my Perl script basically takes a string and then tries to clean it up by doing multiple search and replaces on it, like so:</p> <pre><code>$text =~ s/&lt;[^&gt;]+&gt;/ /g; $text =~ s/\s+/ /g; $text =~ s/[\(\{\[]\d+[\(\{\[]/ /g; $text =~ s/\s+[&lt;&gt;]+\s+/\. /g; $text =~ s/\s+/ /g; $text =~ s/\.*\s*[\*|\#]+\s*([A-Z\"])/\. $1/g; # replace . **** Begin or . #### Begin or ) *The $text =~ s/\.\s*\([^\)]*\) ([A-Z])/\. $1/g; # . (blah blah) S... =&gt; . S... </code></pre> <p>As you can see, I'm dealing with nasty html and have to beat it into submission. </p> <p>I'm hoping there is a simpler, aesthetically appealing way to do this. I have about 50 lines that look just like what is above.</p> <p>I have solved one version of this problem by using a hash where the key is the comment, and the hash is the reg expression, like so:</p> <pre><code>%rxcheck = ( 'time of day'=&gt;'\d+:\d+', 'starts with capital letters then a capital word'=&gt;'^([A-Z]+\s)+[A-Z][a-z]', 'ends with a single capital letter'=&gt;'\b[A-Z]\.' } </code></pre> <p>And this is how I use it:</p> <pre><code> foreach my $key (keys %rxcheck) { if($snippet =~ /$rxcheck{ $key }/g){ blah blah } } </code></pre> <p>The problem comes up when I try my hand at a hash that where the key is the expression and it points to what I want to replace it with... and there is a $1 or $2 in it.</p> <pre><code>%rxcheck2 = ( '(\w) \"'=&gt;'$1\"' } </code></pre> <p>The above is to do this:</p> <pre><code>$snippet =~ s/(\w) \"/$1\"/g; </code></pre> <p>But I can't seem to pass the "$1" part into the regex literally (I think that's the right word... it seems the $1 is being interpreted even though I used ' marks.) So this results in:</p> <pre><code>if($snippet =~ /$key/$rxcheck2{ $key }/g){ } </code></pre> <p>And that doesn't work.</p> <p>So 2 questions:</p> <p>Easy: How do I handle large numbers of regex's in an easily editable way so I can change and add them without just cut and pasting the line before?</p> <p>Harder: How do I handle them using a hash (or array if I have, say, multiple pieces I want to include, like 1) part to search, 2) replacement 3) comment, 4) global/case insensitive modifiers), if that is in fact the easiest way to do this?</p> <p>Thanks for your help -</p>
 

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