Re: Re: need some regex help to strip out // comments but not http:// urls

On Wed, May 29, 2013 at 7:27 PM, Sean Greenslade <zootboysean@gmail.com>wrote: > > It is possible to write a whole parser as a single regex, being it > terribly > > long and complex. > > That said, there's no other simple syntax that would work, for example in > > javascript you could to the following: > > var http = 5; > > switch(value) { > > case http:// Http case here! (this whould not be > > deleted) > > // Do something > > } > > But most likely you wouldn't care about that.. > > > > - Matijn > > I would have to disagree. There are things that regex just can't at a > fundamental level grok. Things like nested brackets (e.g. the standard > blocking syntax of C, javascript, php, etc.). It's not a parser, and > despite all the little lookahead/behind tricks that enhanced regex can > do, it can't at a fundamental level _interret_ the text it sees. This > task involves interpreting what the text you're looking for actually > means, and should therefore be handled by something that can > interpret. > I think it should be possible, but as I said, very very complex. Let's not try it;) > > Also, (I haven't tested it, but) I don't think that example you gave > would work. Without any sort of quoting around the "Kò®2 > ­\5?Æò—)http://" > , I would assume the JS interpreter would take that double slash as a > comment starter. Do tell me if I'm wrong, though. > > Which is exactly what I meant. Because http is a var set to 5, it is a valid case statement, it would be equal to: switch(value) { case 5: // Http case here! (this whould not be deleted) // Do something } But any regex given above would treat the first one as a http url, and won't strip the // and everything after it, though in this modified case it will strip the comments. - Matijn