search and replace on phrase

[dwlamb]

I am undertaking a conversion from an export of an odt file and wish to do a regular expression search and replace of strings of words individually italicised instead of the entire phrase.

I have

<i>something</i> <i>like</i> <i>this</i>

and want

<i>something like this</i>

I came up with this

<i>(.*)</i>\s<i>(.*)</i>\s

but at times it is too greedy, trapping

<i>something</i> <i>like</i> <i>this</i> blah blah. More words and then <i>another</i> <i>string</i> <i>in</i> <i>italics</i>

Any ideas would be most welcome for how to write the search string and not trap a large block in between phrases

[BobC]

Would a simple S&R on </i> <i> replaced by a space not do what you want.

i.e get rid of the adjacent end and start italic tags.

Don't even need regex !

BobC

[Doitsu]

Originally Posted by dwlamb

I have

<i>something</i> <i>like</i> <i>this</i>

and want

<i>something like this</i>

How about searching for </i> <i> and replacing it with a space?

[Turtle91]

That's what I use.
</i> <i> => {space}
</i>, <i> => ", "
</i>. <i> => ". "

[dwlamb]

*sigh* Sometimes we get so close to the forest we can not see the trees.

Thanks for the help one and all.