Find and replace stopped working

[jhempel24]

So I'm trying to figure out what I"m doing wrong. Find and Replace just stopped working, it won't replace anything.

I'm putting in this:

<p class="calibre4"><span class="calibre7">2</span></p>

And I want to increase the number for chapters, so I'm putting this in the Find and Replace box in REGEX:

<p class="calibre4"><span class="calibre7">(\d+)</span></p> -- I've done this with and without parentheses

Then replacing with:

<h2 align="center">\1</h2> -- I've also tried the other slash, number first as well as behind

Any thoughts as to why it won't replace anything?

Thanks!!

[cuthbert19]

Check that you've selected "regular expression" for the "Search mode", in the search/replace dialog ... in "normal" or "wildcard" mode, what you want to do doesn't work

[jhempel24]

DOH!! Yeah, thanks alot...I forgot the check the "more options" button

[theducks]

Originally Posted by jhempel24

DOH!! Yeah, thanks alot...I forgot the check the "more options" button

Don't feel bad.
I spent 10 minutes 'fixing' my search only to I was set to Normal (and I leave the options showing)

[Hitch]

While we're here....@Valloric, is there any plan to/progress toward/whatever to switching Sigil to PCRE (Perl-Compatible Regular Expression)? It just still flakes, or isn't quite as robust as one could hope, as-is....just askin', and if there's an issue on this, I didn't see it, sorry.

best,
Hitch

[Valloric]

Originally Posted by Hitch

While we're here....@Valloric, is there any plan to/progress toward/whatever to switching Sigil to PCRE (Perl-Compatible Regular Expression)? It just still flakes, or isn't quite as robust as one could hope, as-is....just askin', and if there's an issue on this, I didn't see it, sorry.

There's a plan in place to do it, and an issue to boot. But there are just so many other issues that I find more important than this one...

I keep telling people, it's triage. Yes, your issue is a "broken leg", but the other guy's issue is "head keeps falling off" and that has to take priority.

If I had more time/people... Did I mention that I wasn't planning on being the only guy working on Sigil two years after initial release? True story.

[Rand Brittain]

Originally Posted by Valloric

If I had more time/people... Did I mention that I wasn't planning on being the only guy working on Sigil two years after initial release? True story.

Why is that, anyway? I thought e-readers were getting pretty popular; you'd think the software would have more support.

[Toxaris]

True, but now Valloric can decide what goes in. He made a good post on his blog why he is still the only one working on Sigil. Work goes slow perhaps, but it keeps it from becoming bloated and slow.

Although some things are useful, a lot of things are not. At least, not for most.

[Valloric]

Originally Posted by Rand Brittain

Why is that, anyway? I thought e-readers were getting pretty popular; you'd think the software would have more support.

Beats me.

I know a few people who said they wanted to contribute to Sigil on a more long-term basis, but then changed their mind when they found out Sigil was written in C++. It's a challenging language, that's certainly true; not at all "fun and sexy" to develop with.

But in general, I don't have a clue. There have been a few (very) minor patches here and there (and I thank the contributors), but that's pretty much it.

[troll05]

Another question about "find and replace". If I want to delete pagenumbers coded like this: <span>[7]</span> , is there a kind of placeholder or joker for the digit like the asterisk in Windows programms? Tried this, backslash and some others to no avail, except deleting significant parts of the book

[theducks]

Originally Posted by troll05

Another question about "find and replace". If I want to delete pagenumbers coded like this: <span>[7]</span> , is there a kind of placeholder or joker for the digit like the asterisk in Windows programms? Tried this, backslash and some others to no avail, except deleting significant parts of the book

Regex Search:
<span>\[\d+\]</span>

That is everything, including any amount of digits between the square brackets.
You have to 'escape' the brackets as they mean range/set in normal usage
([a-f] = a single letter in the set: a through f )

[troll05]

Originally Posted by theducks

Regex Search:
<span>\[\d+\]</span>

That is everything, including any amount of digits between the square brackets.
You have to 'escape' the brackets as they mean range/set in normal usage
([a-f] = a single letter in the set: a through f )

Thanks, works fine, although I have no clue what you mean with the second part, but it's enough to delete this annoying page numbers

[theducks]

Originally Posted by troll05

Thanks, works fine, although I have no clue what you mean with the second part, but it's enough to delete this annoying page numbers

I was explaining why I put a \ before the [
There are magic characters that mean something to REGEX.
If you want to search for one of those, you must precede it with a \
to escape the normal REGEX usage.

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by Valloric

There's a plan in place to do it, and an issue to boot. But there are just so many other issues that I find more important than this one...

I keep telling people, it's triage. Yes, your issue is a "broken leg", but the other guy's issue is "head keeps falling off" and that has to take priority.

If I had more time/people... Did I mention that I wasn't planning on being the only guy working on Sigil two years after initial release? True story.

Hi:

Thanks for responding. Yeah...I know it's not head-trauma. And I freely admit that we probably run Sigil through the grinder more than the average bear, because we do production with it in fairly good-sized quantities, so we have more frequent need for a heartier regex than most folks. And, yeah, we can unzip the whole thing and suck the html it into NT, and use its regex, which is PCRE...we're just lazy. And of course, I just mostly LOVE Sigil and would use it solely if I could. So, as I said...just askin'. Maybe a teeny-weeny hopeful nudge.

P.S. - took a little time and played with the 0.4.0 beta today...been putting off installing it, since we DO run production, and wanted to wait until it was a little more stable...but it's looking really good, and the ability to keep pre-existing TOC's will save me a lot of brain-damage on epubs I'm revamping--thanks (although personally--I like using structure for TOC's, but...). I'm excited about the ability to play with the OPF and ncx, too. Smokin'.

Thanks,
Hitch

[Valloric]

Originally Posted by Hitch

P.S. - took a little time and played with the 0.4.0 beta today...been putting off installing it, since we DO run production, and wanted to wait until it was a little more stable...but it's looking really good, and the ability to keep pre-existing TOC's will save me a lot of brain-damage on epubs I'm revamping--thanks (although personally--I like using structure for TOC's, but...). I'm excited about the ability to play with the OPF and ncx, too. Smokin'.

Thanks,
Hitch

Thanks Hitch. Yeah, I wouldn't use the 0.4.0 betas or RC's in a production environment. This has nothing to do with Sigil directly, but with early beta/RC builds of any software application. Experimental releases are labeled as such for a reason.

Production work should stay on the last stable release until all the major bugs are ironed out in dev and a new stable release is published. Even then, it may be wise to hold off until a few point releases have passed after a major one to be sure nothing ugly bites you when you're not looking.