Removing a block of text using PHP

[Manga27]

Need a solution here. Working in PHP, but I can switch to a different language if it will help me solve this problem (i.e. a java function, for example...) I need to parse a block of text and remove parts of it. I have this block of text:

<!-- START EXAMPLE TEXT -->
other text
blach blah blah
some < HTML > tag
< TABLE width=640 >
< TR >
< FORM action="test.cgi" >
< /tr >
< / table >
blah blah
welcome to my website
<!-- END EXAMPLE TEXT -->

What I basically need, is to remove everything from "< TABLE..." all the way down to "...action=", and then remove the "< /tr >" and the "< /table >". Also, I can't touch any of the text around it.

The problem: I have tried preg_replace, ereg_replace, str_replace...everything. When I do just this:

ereg_replace("< TABLE width=640 >", "", $raw_content);

that works fine.

BUT, when I try to do MORE than one line, i.e.:

ereg_replace("< TABLE width=640 >
< TR >
< FORM action=", "", $raw_content);

that just doesn't work. No way no how. Any ideas?

Thanks in advance!

[Sxooter]

If you want it to be more generic, you might wanna try it something like:

eregi_replace("< table.+action","",$text);

the .+ means one or more characters.

[Manga27]

Originally posted by Sxooter
If you want it to be more generic, you might wanna try it something like:

eregi_replace("< table.+action","",$text);

I tried that, didn't seem to work. Here's the real code that I am working with, and the function that I am calling:

<!-- CODE SNIPPET -->
< TD VALIGN="TOP" align="center" >< span >< BR >< BR ><!--01.08/2002b cartOrder.txt -->< FORM

METHOD = "post" ACTION = "https:// www .domain.com/cgi-bin/cart.cgi" >
< TABLE cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" rules="none" border="0" >
< TR >
<!-- END CODE SNIPPET -->

Basically, I want to parse this text and get it down to:

< TD VALIGN="TOP" align="center" >< span >< BR >< BR ><!--01.08/2002b -->
< A HREF=" [url]https://[/url] www .domain.com/cgi-bin/cart.cgi" >

So I am calling these functions:

$raw_content = eregi_replace("cartOrder.+ACTION = ", "--> < A HREF=", $raw_content);
$raw_content = eregi_replace("cart.cgi.+< TR >", "cart.cgi\">", $raw_content);

But it doesn't seem to work this way. Am I doing something wrong? (That's a rhetorical question, I MUST be doing something wrong! ;-) )

Thanks again, in advance.

[Sxooter]

The problem is that eregi_replace is "greedy" so if you tell it to

print eregi_replace("aaa.+bbb","","aaabbbaaabbb");

it will print nothing, because it grabs from the first aaa to the last bbb. So, you need to just replace the stuff you wanna get rid of only.

It's likely your regex is grabbing all the way to the second --> here.

[Manga27]

was going to post again, but edited it out... give me a sec... 🙂

[Manga27]

Ok, it seems that I have narrowed it down, and the problem has to do with the quotes around everything. It is tripping up the eregi for some reason. Any ideas?

[Manga27]

Hey Sxooter, I've simplified this code up a bit and I am still having problems. Here is the new string:

 <TD VALIGN=TOP ALIGN=CENTER>
     <span><BR>
     <BR>
     <!--01.08/2002b cartOrder.txt -->
     <FORM  METHOD='POST' ACTION='https://www.tias.com/cgi-bin/cart.cgi'>

And here is the eregi:

$raw_content = eregi_replace("cartOrder.+ACTION = ", "", $raw_content);

so everything from cartOrder to ACTION= should be replace with nothing... but it is not doing any of this. Any ideas?

[Sxooter]

Ahh try this:

eregi_replace("cartorder.+action = ","",$text);

Note the after the spaces. Since you MIGHT have spaces (but in this case didn't) the <space> says 0 or more spaces. I.e. a space if it's there matches, and if it's not, it still matches.

[Manga27]

Originally posted by Sxooter
Ahh try this:

eregi_replace("cartorder.+action = ","",$text);

Note the after the spaces. Since you MIGHT have spaces (but in this case didn't) the <space> says 0 or more spaces. I.e. a space if it's there matches, and if it's not, it still matches.

Ok that didn't work. I must be missing out on something, I just don't get. I even tried to do just this:

$raw_content = eregi_replace("<!--.+-->", "", $raw_content);

and

$raw_content = eregi_replace("<!-- .+ -->", "", $raw_content);

...to see if it would filter out anything in comment tags... but it didn't. Any ideas?

Thanks again bro.

[Sxooter]

eregi_replace("cartorder.+ACTION = "," -->\n<A HREF=",$text);