Please ignore my previous post - Re: Automating an atypical search & replace

Please ignore my previous post - it would delete the whole span'ed
section!


It just occurred to me you'd probably want something like

  /<span class='add'>
  df>
  /<\/span>
  df>

And if you're using recording of the commands (I'll provide code
on demand) just repeat the recordings. You can also just use the
arrow keys after typing  /  to get the previous search patterns
if you like.


On 13.07.2024 19:48, Janis Papanagnou wrote:

On 13.07.2024 18:08, Richard Owlett wrote:

I'm reformatting some HTML files containing chapters of the KJV Bible.
My source follows the practice of italicizing some words.
I find italics distracting.
>
These occurrences are consistently of the form
   <span class='add'>arbitrary_text</span>
>
I wish to delete "<span class='add'>" and *ASSOCIATED* "</span>".
Obviously it would not be wise to fully automate the action.
I wish to find all occurrences of <span
class='add'>arbitrary_text</span> an manually confirm the edit.
>
In general, is it feasible?

 
Yes, sure.
 
Some remarks...
I would use Regular Expressions (RE) for that task.
If <span> sections can be nested in your HTML source then you
cannot do that with plain RE processors.
Since you want to inspect each <span> pattern individually it's
not clear what you mean by "automate" (which I'd interpret as
running a batch job to do the process).
Actually you seem to want a sequential find + replace-or-skip.
 
In Vim I'd search for the "<span ..." pattern and then delete
to the next "</span>" pattern. (Assuming no nested <span>.)
Rinse repeat.
That could be (for example) the commands [case 1]
 
  /<span class='add'>
  d/<\/span>df>
 
If there's no other <...> inside the span-sections you could
simplify that to [case 2]
 
  /<span class='add'>
  d2f>
 
with the opportunity to repeat those search+delete commands
by simply typing  n.  for every match, like  n.n.n.n.  or if
you want to skip some like, e.g.,   n.nnnn.n.nnn.n
 
With  n  you get to the next span pattern and  .  repeats the
last command.
 
In [case 1] the repeat isn't possible since we have two delete
operations  d/<\/span>  and  df>  , but here you can define
macros to trigger the command by a keystroke or just use the
recording function to repeat the once recorded commands.
 
Sounds complicated? - Maybe. - But if we know your exact data
format we can provide the best command sequence for Vim for
most easy use.
 
 

Can KDE's Kate do it?

 
Don't know.
 
Janis
 

>
TIA