I am not an expert in Perl, but wouldn't $test_data =~ s/north/N./gi;
be sufficient? Regards, Tushar Jain On Mon, Jan 28, 2013 at 2:42 PM, Nathan Hilterbrand <noset...@cotse.net>wrote: > On 01/28/2013 02:57 PM, Angela Barone wrote: > >> Hello, >> >> I'm trying to abbreviate ordinals(?) that occur only in the >> middle of an address and I'm having a problem. The line below works: >> >> $test_data =~ s/(\S) North (\S)/$1 N. $2/i; >> >> however, if the address is something like 901 North St., it abbreviates >> that as well. I'm wanting it to work only on an address like >> 53 North Benson St. -> 53 N. Benson St. >> >> Is there a way to know whether or not 'North' is a street name as >> opposed to a direction, or am I asking too much? I was thinking of >> counting the number of "words" between "North' and 'St.' (and if it's zero >> then don't do it), but I wouldn't know how to do that or even if that's the >> best way to do it. >> >> Thanks! >> Angela >> > Angela, > > This worked for me: > > $test_data =~ s/(\S) North (\S+\s[^.]+\.)/$1 N. $2/; > > It assumes that the address ends in an abbreviation such as Rd., St., > Ave., etc. > > -- > To unsubscribe, e-mail: beginners-unsubscr...@perl.org > For additional commands, e-mail: beginners-h...@perl.org > http://learn.perl.org/ > > >
