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    Delete lines in multiple text/DAT files that contain specific characters

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    • Alan KilbornA
      Alan Kilborn @Adam Bowsky
      last edited by

      @Adam-Bowsky

      Oh, sorry I missed the multi-file aspect of your question! Must not be my day.

      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
      • Adam BowskyA
        Adam Bowsky @supasillyass
        last edited by

        @supasillyass It worked! thank you!

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        • Adam BowskyA
          Adam Bowsky
          last edited by

          @supasillyass It worked for files that had 1 digit in front of the text. Some of the files have 2, 3, and 4 digits, EX:

          11N90-SS9035X 00000000
          311N90-SS9035X 00000000
          6001N90-SS9035X 00000000

          Unfortunately, I am not sure of what the switches do, or if there is a different variance I need to use.

          \r\n[ ]*.N90-.*00000000$

          supasillyassS 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
          • Michael VincentM
            Michael Vincent
            last edited by

            @Adam-Bowsky

            How about:

            \r\n\s+\d{1,4}N90-.*\s+00000000$
            

            The \r\n matches a windows carriage return, line feed. If you’re not using Windows (CR/LF) but rather Unix (LF), just remove the ‘\r’.

            The \s+ means match white space at least once but get as many as possible (you said there is preceding space on each line).

            The \d{1,4} means match a digit at least once, but not more than 4 times - you said “Some of the files have 2, 3, and 4 digits”.

            The N90- is self explanatory

            The .* means match any character (.) or or more times (*).

            The \s+ is spacing again before all the trailing '0’s, which themselves are self-explanatory.

            Finally, the $ is stop at the end of the line.

            Adam BowskyA 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 2
            • Michael VincentM
              Michael Vincent
              last edited by

              Using PREGGER:

              PS VinsWorldcom@:~> pregger "/\r\n\s+\d{1,4}N90-.*\s+00000000$/"
              The regular expression:
              
              (?-imsx:\r\n\s+\d{1,4}N90-.*\s+00000000$)
              
              matches as follows:
              
              NODE                     EXPLANATION
              ----------------------------------------------------------------------
              (?-imsx:                 group, but do not capture (case-sensitive)
                                       (with ^ and $ matching normally) (with . not
                                       matching \n) (matching whitespace and #
                                       normally):
              ----------------------------------------------------------------------
                \r                       '\r' (carriage return)
              ----------------------------------------------------------------------
                \n                       '\n' (newline)
              ----------------------------------------------------------------------
                \s+                      whitespace (\n, \r, \t, \f, and " ") (1 or
                                         more times (matching the most amount
                                         possible))
              ----------------------------------------------------------------------
                \d{1,4}                  digits (0-9) (between 1 and 4 times
                                         (matching the most amount possible))
              ----------------------------------------------------------------------
                N90-                     'N90-'
              ----------------------------------------------------------------------
                .*                       any character except \n (0 or more times
                                         (matching the most amount possible))
              ----------------------------------------------------------------------
                \s+                      whitespace (\n, \r, \t, \f, and " ") (1 or
                                         more times (matching the most amount
                                         possible))
              ----------------------------------------------------------------------
                00000000                 '00000000'
              ----------------------------------------------------------------------
                $                        before an optional \n, and the end of the
                                         string
              ----------------------------------------------------------------------
              )                        end of grouping
              ----------------------------------------------------------------------
              
              PS VinsWorldcom@:~>
              
              1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
              • supasillyassS
                supasillyass @Adam Bowsky
                last edited by

                @Adam-Bowsky

                The dot indicated matches a single character:

                \r\n[ ]*.N90-.*00000000$
                        ^
                

                So change it to match a string of digits:

                \r\n[ ]*[0-9]*N90-.*00000000$
                        ^^^^^^
                

                There’s also an edge case not matched where the first line has N90-, so follow up with: ^[ ]*[0-9]*N90-.*00000000\r\n

                Adam BowskyA 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 2
                • Adam BowskyA
                  Adam Bowsky @Michael Vincent
                  last edited by

                  @Michael-Vincent thank you! I believe this worked correctly. 1 question… “the match a digit at least once”… does this include preceding zeros? For example, if the line had looked like this: 00001N90-SS9035X? If so, would I change \d{1,4} to \d{1,5}?

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                  • Michael VincentM
                    Michael Vincent
                    last edited by

                    @Adam-Bowsky said:

                    For example, if the line had looked like this: 00001N90-SS9035X? If so, would I change \d{1,4} to \d{1,5}?

                    It does not include preceding zeros by default. Zeros (0) are numbers (digits) so they would count towards the 4 maximum ( { …, 4} ). You’re correct in that if you had 4 leading zeros, then \d{1,5} would match it.

                    I like to be precise in my RegEx (as precise as possible) to not catch anything I shouldn’t. I’d rather be cautious than aggressive when doing a bulk replace like this. You could just use \d+ which would match at least 1 and as many digits in a row (similar to the \s+ we’ve been using).

                    Cheers.

                    Adam BowskyA 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 2
                    • Adam BowskyA
                      Adam Bowsky @supasillyass
                      last edited by

                      @supasillyass thanks!

                      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                      • Adam BowskyA
                        Adam Bowsky @Michael Vincent
                        last edited by

                        @Michael-Vincent thanks again!

                        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                        • Adam BowskyA
                          Adam Bowsky
                          last edited by

                          Re: Delete lines in multiple text/DAT files that contain specific characters

                          Hello,

                          I have been using this process since you were kind enough to help me, and just notices that I am running into a problem with this expression: \r\n\s+\d{1,4}N90-.*\s+00000000$. in addition to deleting the line that has the N90- with a , it is also deleting the line above it. For example, the line above was deleted in addition to the line that I wanted to delete. This is happening on every file where N90- is present. Do you have any idea why this is happening?

                                10DTP-1040K           00000000  This should not have been deleted, but was.
                                10N90-SS7784X         00000000 This was deleted correctly.
                          
                          Adam BowskyA 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                          • Adam BowskyA
                            Adam Bowsky @Adam Bowsky
                            last edited by

                            @Michael-Vincent

                            Hello,

                            I have been using this process since you were kind enough to help me, and just notices that I am running into a problem with this expression: \r\n\s+\d{1,4}N90-.*\s+00000000$. in addition to deleting the line that has the N90- with a , it is also deleting the line above it. For example, the line above was deleted in addition to the line that I wanted to delete. This is happening on every file where N90- is present. Do you have any idea why this is happening?

                              10DTP-1040K           00000000  This should not have been deleted, but was.
                              10N90-SS7784X         00000000 This was deleted correctly.
                            
                            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                            • guy038G
                              guy038
                              last edited by guy038

                              Hello, @adam-bowsky, @michael-vincent, @supasillyass and All,

                              Personally, I would use the following regex S/R, which should work in all the discussed cases !

                              I simply assume that the N90- string, with this exact case, is preceded with, at least, one digit !

                              SEARCH (?-si)^\h*\d+N90-.*\R?

                              REPLACE Leave EMPTY

                              Of course, the Regular expression search mode is selected and the Wrap around option is ticked

                              Give a try !

                              I’ll give you some explanations when everything is right ;-))

                              Best Regards

                              guy038

                              1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
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