Well, I guess I'm not quite there yet. What I gave earlier was a simplified example, and did not accurately reflect the complexity of the task.
This is my real world example. As you can see, what I need to do is delete an arbitrary number of characters, including brackets and parens enclosing them, multiple times within the same string. Help? myCharVec <- "medicare [link 220.30.05] ssa (1-800-772-1213). 2008 [link 145.30.05] amounts (2d) gross income (magi) here. (2e)" myCharVec myCharVec <- gsub('\\[.*\\]', '', myCharVec) myCharVec myCharVec <- gsub('\\(.*\\)', '', myCharVec) myCharVec #what I want # "medicare ssa . 2008 amounts gross income here." myCharVec <- "medicare [link 220.30.05] ssa (1-800-772-1213). 2008 [link 145.30.05] amounts (2d) gross income (magi) here. (2e)" > myCharVec [1] "medicare [link 220.30.05] ssa (1-800-772-1213). 2008 [link 145.30.05] amounts (2d) gross income (magi) here. (2e)" > myCharVec <- gsub('\\[.*\\]', '', myCharVec) > myCharVec [1] "medicare amounts (2d) gross income (magi) here. (2e)" > myCharVec <- gsub('\\(.*\\)', '', myCharVec) > myCharVec [1] "medicare amounts " > > #what I want > # "medicare ssa . 2008 amounts gross income here." ------------------------------------------------------------ Mark W. Kimpel MD ** Neuroinformatics ** Dept. of Psychiatry Indiana University School of Medicine 15032 Hunter Court, Westfield, IN 46074 (317) 490-5129 Work, & Mobile & VoiceMail "The real problem is not whether machines think but whether men do." -- B. F. Skinner ****************************************************************** On Thu, Aug 20, 2009 at 11:39 AM, William Dunlap <wdun...@tibco.com> wrote: > > > -----Original Message----- > > From: r-help-boun...@r-project.org > > [mailto:r-help-boun...@r-project.org] On Behalf Of Mark Kimpel > > Sent: Thursday, August 20, 2009 8:31 AM > > To: r-help@r-project.org > > Subject: [R] help with regular expressions in R > > ... > > myCharVec <- c("[the rain in spain]", "(the rain in spain)") > > gsub('\\[*.\\]', '', myCharVec) > > Change the '*.' to '.*'. > > Your expression matches 0 or more left square brackets, > followed by 1 character, followed by a right squared bracket. > > "\\[.*\]]" matches a left square bracket, followed by 0 or more > characters, followed by a right square bracket. > > Bill Dunlap > TIBCO Software Inc - Spotfire Division > wdunlap tibco.com > > > > > #what I get > > # [1] "[the rain in spai" "(the rain in spain)" > > > > #what I want > > [1] "" "(the rain in spain)" > > > > > sessionInfo() > > R version 2.10.0 Under development (unstable) (2009-08-12 r49193) > > x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu > > > > locale: > > [1] LC_CTYPE=en_US.UTF-8 LC_NUMERIC=C > > [3] LC_TIME=en_US.UTF-8 LC_COLLATE=en_US.UTF-8 > > [5] LC_MONETARY=C LC_MESSAGES=en_US.UTF-8 > > [7] LC_PAPER=en_US.UTF-8 LC_NAME=C > > [9] LC_ADDRESS=C LC_TELEPHONE=C > > [11] LC_MEASUREMENT=en_US.UTF-8 LC_IDENTIFICATION=C > > > > attached base packages: > > [1] stats graphics grDevices datasets utils methods base > > > > other attached packages: > > [1] RWeka_0.3-20 tm_0.4 > > > > loaded via a namespace (and not attached): > > [1] grid_2.10.0 rJava_0.6-3 slam_0.1-3 > > > > > > ------------------------------------------------------------ > > Mark W. Kimpel MD ** Neuroinformatics ** Dept. of Psychiatry > > Indiana University School of Medicine > > > > 15032 Hunter Court, Westfield, IN 46074 > > > > (317) 490-5129 Work, & Mobile & VoiceMail > > > > "The real problem is not whether machines think but whether > > men do." -- B. > > F. Skinner > > ****************************************************************** > > > > [[alternative HTML version deleted]] > > > > ______________________________________________ > > R-help@r-project.org mailing list > > https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help > > PLEASE do read the posting guide > > http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html > > and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. > > > [[alternative HTML version deleted]] ______________________________________________ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.