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Without me writing a custom program in a programming language. Does the Advanced F&R utility have a way of creating a file that can output each occurrence of the (((( & )))) delimiters and the text between them..

For example:

This is a test of ((((a utility that might do what i need it to do)))). It has alot of features but not (((sure if it can do it))))
((((test3))))
((((test4))))


So the resulting output file would look anything like this

a utility that might do what i need it to do
sure if it can do it
test3
test4

and if so, how is it done.

Thanks
Mike

Hi Mike,

Sure it's possible to do with Advanced Find and Replace.

Go to main menu - Action - Options - Batch Replace
check "Modifier S"
check "Modifier G"

Go to Batch replace tab, check on "Use regular expressions".
Put into the grid these lines,

Search for:
\A.*?\(+

Replace with:
empty

Search for:
\)+\s*\r\n\(+

Replace with:
\r\n

Search for:
\)+.*?\(+

Replace with:
empty

Search for:
\)+[^\)]*?\Z

Replace with:
empty

That's all. I verified it works perfectly.

It worked great, just as you said I am still trying to figure out how to change the delimiters. if i wanted to change the

((( and )))

to

[( and )]

How would I do so?


Thanks
Mike

It's easy:

Search for:
((( and )))

Replace with:
[( and )]

You even don't need to use regular expressions

Your original instructions worked great with this document:

This is a sample document (((Note #1))) and ((( Note #2 foobar)))

which made the file:

Note #1
Note #2


Now I was hoping to do the same with this document:
[( Note #1)] and [( Note #2 foobar)]

Where rather than ((( & ))) we have [( & )]

I can't figure out the expressions you sent me and where to make the changes in it to do as I need

Thanks
Mike

In the given expressions above:
replace all \( by \[\(
and \) by \)\]