Regular Expressions - Please Help!

[phi177]

Hi. I've been trying to work with this all afternoon and had no luck. I'm trying to write code replace a certain HTML tag in a text document.

The line in the text file that I'm trying to work with is:

will begin his presentation at <st1:time Minute="30" Hour="9">9:30 a.m. in 100 Butler Hall, home of the computer science and engineering department.

I'm trying to remove <st1:time Minute="30" Hour="9">

using this code:
$htmlsearch2 = "/<st1:time Minute=\"30\" Hour=\"9\">/";
$story = preg_replace($htmlsearch2, '', $story);

When I run that, it skips over the tag entirely.

BUT

When I use this code (which only leaves out the final "> characters)

$htmlsearch2 = "/<st1:time Minute=\"30\" Hour=\"9/";
$story = preg_replace($htmlsearch2, '', $story);

It works and I get this result:

will begin his presentation at ">9:30 a.m. in 100 Butler Hall, home of the computer science and engineering department.

Not sure why I can't get it to include that "> before the time.

Any thoughts??? This is really frustrating!

Thanks!!

[TheDefender]

This works for me...

$story = 'will begin his presentation at <st1:time Minute="30" Hour="9">9:30 a.m. in 100 Butler Hall, home of the computer science and engineering department.';
$htmlsearch2 = '/<st1:time Minute="30" Hour="9">/'; 
$story = preg_replace($htmlsearch2, '', $story); 
echo $story;

[phi177]

Defender, Thank you for your reply.

I would use the code that you posted, but the time variables change with different stories that we post.

In other words, for some other applications, it may be

<st1:time Minute="45" Hour="10">
<st1:time Minute="15" Hour="20">
<st1:time Minute="05" Hour="7">
<st1:time Minute="00" Hour="15">
etc.

How can I make the code versatile enough to handle any time situation?

Thanks!

[TheDefender]

Can you elaborate on exactly how you are trying to do things? The code I provided was really no change on what you were asking for... Give a detailed example on what you are expecting to see, and what you are wanting to do, and we can help you out. For example, is the tag in the story already or are you inserting it? Also, do you need something that uses every hour/minute combination?

[Drakla]

Try

'/<st1:time Minute="[^"]" Hour="[^"]">/'

as the parameter string, or it might be

'/<st1:time Minute="[^"]" Hour="[^"]">/'

depending on the greediness setting.

[phi177]

'/<st1:time Minute="[^"]" Hour="[^"]">/'

worked perfectly!!! thanks, Drakla.

I appreciate your help with this, too, Defender.

[Drakla]

Chuffed I could help.

Could you mark this thread as resolved, there's an option for it somewhere on the page, and you're the only one that can do it.

Cheers.

[TheDefender]

LOL... "somewhere on the page"

It's at the bottom and it looks something like this:
Mark Thread Resolved (thread starter only)