RegEx question for Trados Studio Thread poster: MikeTrans
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MikeTrans
Germany
Local time: 16:08
Italian to German
+ ...
Hello,
It's very useful to use Regular Expressions in the Find & Replace, as well as in the filters of Studio. I have this generic problem and no response after consulting my various RegEx documentations:
In the 'Find' row of Find & Replace, I would like to enter a RegEx for matching the pure position in the segment without matching any character. Is this possible?
For example, in order to insert something at the start of my target segment, I can easily type what ... See more Hello,
It's very useful to use Regular Expressions in the Find & Replace, as well as in the filters of Studio. I have this generic problem and no response after consulting my various RegEx documentations:
In the 'Find' row of Find & Replace, I would like to enter a RegEx for matching the pure position in the segment without matching any character. Is this possible?
For example, in order to insert something at the start of my target segment, I can easily type what I want to insert in the Replace box, but what RegEx should I insert in the Find box for matching the start of the segment but WITHOUT matching the first character (which would otherwise be replaced)?
^ = start of line; will match the first letter/digit/non-word character of the segment, but I don't want to replace this one, I want any content in the 'Replace' box inserted BEFORE it!
I hope my question is clear enough for you to see what I mean ..:)
Thank you very much,
Mike ▲ Collapse
| | | | Dan Lucas 
United Kingdom
Local time: 15:08
Member (2014)
Japanese to English
| Insertion is possible | Dec 4, 2016 |
MikeTrans wrote:
^ = start of line; will match the first letter/digit/non-word character of the segment, but I don't want to replace this one, I want any content in the 'Replace' box inserted BEFORE it!
I hope my question is clear enough for you to see what I mean ..:)
To be honest it's not very clear, but it sounds like you want to insert something. One way to do it is with a capturing group.
Find:
^(.*)
Replace:
-inserted-text-${1}
Regards
Dan
| | | | NeoAtlas
Spain
Local time: 16:08
English to Spanish
+ ...
| If I understand correctly… | Dec 4, 2016 |
You can use this regex:
.something
It'll find “something” if there is anything before.
… Jesús Prieto …
| | | | MikeTrans
Germany
Local time: 16:08
Italian to German
+ ...
TOPIC STARTER | Thank you very much... | Dec 4, 2016 |
...Dan Lucas and NeoAtlas to give me some possibilities to work with.
I know my questions were neither simple nor clear, I excuse me for this. The keyword is: 'Insert' into a segment instead of replacing something. A simple example is: Insert something at cursor position 5 after segment start, and without replacing what's left or right of the cursor position, and whatever is left or right (not a constant).
The 'Wildcard' .* should be useful to do what I want, also the exclusio... See more ...Dan Lucas and NeoAtlas to give me some possibilities to work with.
I know my questions were neither simple nor clear, I excuse me for this. The keyword is: 'Insert' into a segment instead of replacing something. A simple example is: Insert something at cursor position 5 after segment start, and without replacing what's left or right of the cursor position, and whatever is left or right (not a constant).
The 'Wildcard' .* should be useful to do what I want, also the exclusion pattern [^...] which i have successfully used to delete parts of a segment.
For me, RegEx is an eternal trial & error procedure... But I'm confident.
Thank you for the assistance,
Mike
[Edited at 2016-12-04 15:28 GMT] ▲ Collapse
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MikeTrans
Germany
Local time: 16:08
Italian to German
+ ...
TOPIC STARTER
Great, you command works perfectly to insert a text at the start of segment!
Could you tell me what the ${1} does?
Taken separately, $ is the end of line and {1} means you want exactly 1 occurence. So ${1} would instruct to go after the end of line and insert 1 time at the start of next line, correct?
Very useful, thanks very much!
Mike
| | | | Nora Diaz
Mexico
Local time: 07:08
Member (2002)
English to Spanish
+ ...
| Inserting something | Dec 4, 2016 |
Hi Mike,
I'm not sure I'm understanding exactly what you need, but here's my attempt:
Say you have a segment with a string like 12345678910, and you want to insert something after the fourth character from the start of the segment, or "4", then you could enter this in the Search box:
^(.{4})
and this in your Replace box:
$1YOURINSERTION
where, of course, YOURINSERTION is what you want to insert.
The result would ... See more Hi Mike,
I'm not sure I'm understanding exactly what you need, but here's my attempt:
Say you have a segment with a string like 12345678910, and you want to insert something after the fourth character from the start of the segment, or "4", then you could enter this in the Search box:
^(.{4})
and this in your Replace box:
$1YOURINSERTION
where, of course, YOURINSERTION is what you want to insert.
The result would be
1234YOURINSERTION5678910 ▲ Collapse
| | | | MikeTrans
Germany
Local time: 16:08
Italian to German
+ ...
TOPIC STARTER
[EDIT]
again I have to excuse my confused description of what I want. Your example works !! I have now to figure out how to change Dan's suggestion to make it work inserting content at the end of a segment. I think I can figure this out, I will have to play trial and error...
Inserting at the start, at the end, or inserting after a specific content in the middle of a segment: these are procedures I want to carry out before I start translating. The purpose is: not having to cop... See more [EDIT]
again I have to excuse my confused description of what I want. Your example works !! I have now to figure out how to change Dan's suggestion to make it work inserting content at the end of a segment. I think I can figure this out, I will have to play trial and error...
Inserting at the start, at the end, or inserting after a specific content in the middle of a segment: these are procedures I want to carry out before I start translating. The purpose is: not having to copy such content manually every time for each individual segment.
Thank you very much,
Mike
[Edited at 2016-12-04 17:07 GMT] ▲ Collapse
| | | | Dan Lucas
United Kingdom
Local time: 15:08
Member (2014)
Japanese to English
| Insertions redux | Dec 4, 2016 |
MikeTrans wrote:
Insert something at cursor position 5 after segment start, and without replacing what's left or right of the cursor position, and whatever is left or right (not a constant).
Yes, that's what capturing groups and backreferences are for. The regex I used earlier has been tested in Studio and it works fine on my system. I suggest you experiment with it.
By using two capturing groups you can perform insertions in the middle of a segment. Say for example you wanted to insert something after the fifth character. Define the first group as the first five characters and the second group as everything after the first five characters. Then when replacing, simply add the text you want inserted between the two groups. The existing text will not be destroyed, but the new text will be inserted.
Find:
^(\S{5})(.*)
Replace:
${1}-text-to-insert-${2}
If you use or want to use regexes, I advise you to buy RegexBuddy for 30 euro. You'll save hours of time and make yourself more efficient.
Dan
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Dan Lucas
United Kingdom
Local time: 15:08
Member (2014)
Japanese to English
| Backreference | Dec 4, 2016 |
MikeTrans wrote:
Could you tell me what the ${1} does?
As explained in the link I provided in my first post, when you put brackets round text in a regex, that text is "captured" as a numbered capturing group. The content of the first set of brackets goes into group 1, the content of the second set of brackets goes into group 2 and so on. You can use the content in these groups by referring to it with the ${n} notation, where n is the group number. See my other post for an example.
To insert text at the end of the segment, experiment with the $ text anchor. I haven't tested it, but try the following.
Find:
(.*)$
Replace:
${1}-text-to-be-inserted
That should insert text at the end.
Dan
| | | | MikeTrans
Germany
Local time: 16:08
Italian to German
+ ...
TOPIC STARTER | Interesting, I must consider this... | Dec 4, 2016 |
Dan Lucas wrote: If you use or want to use regexes, I advise you to buy RegexBuddy for 30 euro. You'll save hours of time and make yourself more efficient. Dan
Thank you Dan for this advice. I will have to go this route I think, I'm generally a curious person that wants to solve puzzles or similar problems, but there are times where I cannot afford to spend so much time for it!
Mike
| | | | Dan Lucas
United Kingdom
Local time: 15:08
Member (2014)
Japanese to English
| The value of your own time | Dec 4, 2016 |
MikeTrans wrote:
but there are times where I cannot afford to spend so much time for it!
Indeed. I am happy to invest in tools if they save me time. If your time is worth, say 40 euro an hour, then if RegexBuddy saves you one hour it will have more than paid for itself.
Dan
| | | | NeoAtlas
Spain
Local time: 16:08
English to Spanish
+ ...
| I didn't know… | Dec 5, 2016 |
I didn't know that ${1}
has the same effect as
$1
Thanks, Dan!
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Dan Lucas
United Kingdom
Local time: 15:08
Member (2014)
Japanese to English
| Specific issue | Dec 5, 2016 |
NeoAtlas wrote:
I didn't know that ${1}has the same effect as $1
It's a feature of the regex "dialect" used by Studio (which is the C# .Net version). There's an awful lot of variation between different flavours of regexes. What works in one piece of software may not work at all in another.
Dan
| | | | Nora Diaz
Mexico
Local time: 07:08
Member (2002)
English to Spanish
+ ...
NeoAtlas wrote:
I didn't know that ${1}
has the same effect as
$1
Thanks, Dan!
I didn't know this either!
Regarding Regex Buddy, I support Dan's suggestion 100%. I've been using it to learn about regular expressions since Paul Filkin recommended it in one of his series of regex posts and have found it very helpful to test regex matches and replacements. The tutorial at the Regex Buddy developer's website, http://www.regular-expressions.info/tutorial.html, is a great source of information about regex as well.
| | | | MikeTrans
Germany
Local time: 16:08
Italian to German
+ ...
TOPIC STARTER | Thank you all for your responses and advices! | Dec 5, 2016 |
For completness, I just want to report that Dan's solution for inserting content at the end (see above) works perfectly too, the condition is that the segment must not be empty.
I found a serie of interesting pages describing RegEx in detail. Generally they list all immaginable commands sorted by options and symbols. But it's their combination in special situations that is tricky. I have built my own list for maintaining translation memories (with Olifant) in the past, but for the t... See more For completness, I just want to report that Dan's solution for inserting content at the end (see above) works perfectly too, the condition is that the segment must not be empty.
I found a serie of interesting pages describing RegEx in detail. Generally they list all immaginable commands sorted by options and symbols. But it's their combination in special situations that is tricky. I have built my own list for maintaining translation memories (with Olifant) in the past, but for the translation work in Trados, I think I will build a new list from scratch depending on the procedures that I mostly use.
All your kind suggestions will sureley be included!
Thank you and best greetings,
Mike
[Edited at 2016-12-05 15:45 GMT] ▲ Collapse
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