Say I have a dataframe df in which a column df$strings contains strings like
[cat 00.04;09]
[cat 00.04;10]
and so on. I want to remove all characters between "[cat" and "]" to yield
[cat]
[cat]
I've tried this using gsub but it's not working and I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong:
gsub('cat*?\\]', '', df)
Note that cat*?\\] patten matches ca, then any 0+ t chars but as few as possible and then ].
You want to match any chars other than ] between [cat and ]:
gsub('\\[cat[^]]*\\]', '[cat]', df$strings)
Here,
\\[ - matches [
cat - matches cat
[^]]* - 0+ chars other than ] (note that ] inside the bracket expression should not be escaped when placed at the start - else, if you escape it, you will need to add perl=TRUE argument since PCRE regex engine can handle regex escapes inside bracket expressions (not the default TRE))
\\] - a ] (you do not even need to escape it, you may just use ]).
See the R demo:
x <- c("[cat 00.04;09]", "[cat 00.04;10]")
gsub('\\[cat[^]]*\\]', '[cat]', x)
## => [1] "[cat]" "[cat]"
If cat can be any word, use
gsub('\\[(\\w+)[^]]*\\]', '[\\1]', x)
where (\\w+) is a capturing group with ID=1 that matches 1 or more word chars, and \\1 in the replacement pattern is a replacement backreference that stands for the group value.
Related
I have seen in manuals how to use grep to match either a pattern or an exact string. However, I cannot figure out how to do both at the same time. I have a latex file where I want to find the following pattern:
\caption[SOME WORDS]
and replace it with:
\caption[\textit{SOME WORDS}]
I have tried with:
texfile <- sub('\\caption[','\\caption[\\textit ', texfile, fixed=TRUE)
but I do not know how to tell grep that there should be some text after the square bracket, and then a closed square bracket.
You can use
texfile <- "\\caption[SOME WORDS]" ## -> \caption[\textit{SOME WORDS}]
texfile <-gsub('(\\\\caption\\[)([^][]*)]','\\1\\\\textit{\\2}]', texfile)
cat(texfile)
## -> \caption[\textit{SOME WORDS}]
See the R demo online.
Details:
(\\caption\[) - Group 1 (\1 in the replacement pattern): a \caption[ string
([^][]*) - Group 2 (\2 in the replacement pattern): any zero or more chars other than [ and ]
] - a ] char.
Another solution based on a PCRE regex:
gsub('\\Q\\caption[\\E\\K([^][]*)]','\\\\textit{\\1}]', texfile, perl=TRUE)
See this R demo online. Details:
\Q - start "quoting", i.e. treating the patterns to the right as literal text
\caption[ - a literal fixed string
\E - stop quoting the pattern
\K - omit text matched so far
([^][]*) - Group 1 (\1): any zero or more non-bracket chars
] - a ] char.
I would like to replace the 70 in between the brackets with a specific string lets say '80'.
from filter[70.00-100.00] --> filter[80.00-100.00]
However when using the following code:
str_replace('filter [70.00-140.00]'," *\\[.*?\\. *",'80')
The output is:
filter8000-140.00]
Is there any way to replace the string between the \ and . (in this case 70) without removing the \ and . ?
To replace any one or more digits after [ use
library(stringr)
str_replace('filter [70.00-140.00]','(?<=\\[)\\d+', '80')
sub('\\[\\d+', '[80', 'filter [70.00-140.00]')
sub('(?<=\\[)\\d+', '80', 'filter [70.00-140.00]', perl=TRUE)
See the online R demo. The (?<=\[)\d+ matches a location immediately preceded with [ and then one or more digits. \[\d+ matches [ and one or more digits, so [ must be restored and thus is added into the replacement pattern.
To replace exactly 70, you can use
library(stringr)
str_replace('filter [70.00-140.00]',"(\\[[^\\]\\[]*)70",'\\180')
# => [1] "filter [80.00-140.00]"
sub('(\\[[^][]*)70','\\180', 'filter [70.00-140.00]')
# => [1] "filter [80.00-140.00]"
See the regex demo. Details:
(\[[^\]\[]*) - Group 1: [, then zero or more chars other than [ and ]
70 - a 70 string.
In the replacement, \1 inserts Group 1 value.
Another solution could be replacing all occurrences of 70 strings inside square brackets that end with a word boundary and are not preceeded with a digit or digit+. (that is, to only match 70 as a whole integer part of a number) with
str_replace_all(
'filter [70.00-140.00]',
'\\[[^\\]\\[]*]',
function(x) gsub('(?<!\\d|\\d\\.)70\\b', '80', x, perl=TRUE))
# => [1] "filter [80.00-140.00]"
Here, \[[^\]\[]*] matches strings between two square brackets having no other square brackets in between and the gsub('(?<!\\d|\\d\\.)70\\b', '80', x, perl=TRUE) is run on the these matched substrings only. The (?<!\d|\d\.)70\b matches any 70 that is not preceded with digit or digit + . and is not followed by another word char (letter, digit or _, or connector punctuation, since ICU regexps are Unicode aware by default).
You can use this. It will replace all digits between the [ and the . :
preg_replace('/(?<=\[)(\d*)(?=\.)/', '80', 'filter [70.00-140.00]');
I want to match every cases of "-", but not these ones:
[\d]-[A-Z]
[A-Z]-[\d]
I tried this pattern: ((?<![A-Z])-(?![0-9]))|((?<![0-9])-(?![A-Z])) but some results are incorrect like: "RUA VF-32 N"
Can anyone help me?
A simple approach is to use grep with your current logic and inverting the result, and then run another grep to only keep those items that have a hyphen in them:
x <- c("QUADRA 120 - ASA BRANCA","FAZENDA LAGE -RODOVIA RIO VERDE","C-15","99-B","A-A")
grep("-", grep("[A-Z]-\\d|\\d-[A-Z]", x, invert=TRUE, value=TRUE), value=TRUE, fixed=TRUE)
# => [1] "QUADRA 120 - ASA BRANCA" "FAZENDA LAGE -RODOVIA RIO VERDE"
# [3] "A-A"
Here, [A-Z]-\\d|\\d-[A-Z] matches a hyphen either in between an uppercase ASCII etter or a digit or betweena digit and an ASCII uppercase letter. If there is a match, the result is inverted due to invert=TRUE.
See the R demo.
To only match - in all contexts other than in between a letter and a digit, you may use the PCRE regex based on SKIP-FAIL technique like
> grep("(?:\\d-[A-Z]|[A-Z]-\\d)(*SKIP)(*F)|-", x, perl=TRUE)
[1] 1 2
See this regex demo
Details
(?:\d-[A-Z]|[A-Z]-\d) - a non-capturing group that matches either a digit, - and then uppercase ASCII letter, or an uppercase ASCII letter, - and a digit
(*SKIP)(*F) - omit the current match and proceed looking for the next match at the end of the "failed" match
| - or
- - a hyphen.
How do I match the year such that it is general for the following examples.
a <- '"You Are There" (1953) {The Death of Socrates (399 B.C.) (#1.14)}'
b <- 'Þegar það gerist (1998/I) (TV)'
I have tried the following, but did not have the biggest success.
gsub('.+\\(([0-9]+.+\\)).?$', '\\1', a)
What I thought it did was to go until it finds a (, then it would make a group of numbers, then any character until it meets a ). And if there are several matches, I want to extract the first group.
Any suggestions to where I go wrong? I have been doing this in R.
You could use
library(stringr)
strings <- c('"You Are There" (1953) {The Death of Socrates (399 B.C.) (#1.14)}', 'Þegar það gerist (1998/I) (TV)')
years <- str_match(strings, "\\((\\d+(?: B\\.C\\.)?)")[,2]
years
# [1] "1953" "1998"
The expression here is
\( # (
(\d+ # capture 1+ digits
(?: B\.C\.)? # B.C. eventually
)
Note that backslashes need to be escaped in R.
Your pattern contains .+ parts that match 1 or more chars as many as possible, and at best your pattern could grab last 4 digit chunks from the incoming strings.
You may use
^.*?\((\d{4})(?:/[^)]*)?\).*
Replace with \1 to only keep the 4 digit number. See the regex demo.
Details
^ - start of string
.*? - any 0+ chars as few as possible
\( - a (
(\d{4}) - Group 1: four digits
(?: - start of an optional non-capturing group
/ - a /
[^)]* - any 0+ chars other than )
)? - end of the group
\) - a ) (OPTIONAL, MAY BE OMITTED)
.* - the rest of the string.
See the R demo:
a <- c('"You Are There" (1953) {The Death of Socrates (399 B.C.) (#1.14)}', 'Þegar það gerist (1998/I) (TV)', 'Johannes Passion, BWV. 245 (1725 Version) (1996) (V)')
sub("^.*?\\((\\d{4})(?:/[^)]*)?\\).*", "\\1", a)
# => [1] "1953" "1998" "1996"
Another base R solution is to match the 4 digits after (:
regmatches(a, regexpr("\\(\\K\\d{4}(?=(?:/[^)]*)?\\))", a, perl=TRUE))
# => [1] "1953" "1998" "1996"
The \(\K\d{4} pattern matches ( and then drops it due to \K match reset operator and then a (?=(?:/[^)]*)?\\)) lookahead ensures there is an optional / + 0+ chars other than ) and then a ). Note that regexpr extracts the first match only.
I want to replace the last number in a string using regex and gsub
S <- "abcd2efghi2.txt"
The last number and the position of the last number can vary.
So I've tried the regex
?<=[\d+])\b
gsub("?<=[\d+])\b", "", S)
but that doesn't seem to work
Appreciate any help.
You can achieve that with a default TRE engine using the following regex:
\d+(\D*)$
Replace with the \1 backreference.
Details
\d+ - 1 or more digits
(\D*) - Capturing group 1: any 0+ non-digit symbols
$ - end of string
\1 - a backreference to the Group 1 value (so as to restore the text matched and consumed with the (\D*) subpattern).
See the regex demo.
R code demo:
sub("\\d+(\\D*)$", "\\1", S)
## => [1] "abcd2efghi.txt"
You could use this regex:
\d+(?=\D*$)
It matches a sequence of digits when everything that follows consists of non-digits (\D) until the end of the string ($).