notepad++ xml node regex find and replace

Question

can you tell me the what to search for in notepad++ in order to find all nodes with the optioncode 09 below and delete that node? For example, I would like to be able to search on the below xml and delete the first entry and be left with is below that.

I tried to searching for <Vehicle>.*?</Vehicle> which works to replace a blank value, however I want to also add criteria to search for the 09 value in the entire node. Is it possible to add a search condition for the ">09<" text string value?

Search here:

  <Vehicle>
    <InvoiceDateTime>2016-03-20T00:00:00</InvoiceDateTime>
    <InvoiceChargeCents>63</InvoiceChargeCents>
    <OptionCode>09</OptionCode>
    <JobEndDateTime>2016-03-19T00:00:00</JobEndDateTime>
    <AuthorizationCode />
  </Vehicle>
  <Vehicle>
    <InvoiceDateTime>2016-03-20T00:00:00</InvoiceDateTime>
    <InvoiceChargeCents>63</InvoiceChargeCents>
    <OptionCode>35</OptionCode>
    <JobEndDateTime>2016-03-19T00:00:00</JobEndDateTime>
    <AuthorizationCode />
  </Vehicle>

Return the entry below:

  <Vehicle>
    <InvoiceDateTime>2016-03-20T00:00:00</InvoiceDateTime>
    <InvoiceChargeCents>63</InvoiceChargeCents>
    <OptionCode>35</OptionCode>
    <JobEndDateTime>2016-03-19T00:00:00</JobEndDateTime>
    <AuthorizationCode />
  </Vehicle>

Wiktor Stribiżew · Accepted Answer · 2016-03-25 20:11:00Z

2

My approach consists in matching the <Vehicle> opening node, and then restrict dot matching so that it could match neither opening nor closing Vehicle nodes with a tempered greedy token:

<Vehicle>(?:(?!</?Vehicle>).)*>09<.*?</Vehicle>\R*

The . matches newline option should be enabled.

See the regex demo, replace with an empty string.

The (?:(?!</?Vehicle>).)* is a tempered greedy token that matches any text up to the first >09< after the closest <Vehicle> opening node.

Note that \R* matches zero or more newline sequences (either CRLF, or CR, or LF).

Also please note that a more efficient pattern will be the unrolled version of the above pattern:

<Vehicle>[^<]*(?:<(?!\/?Vehicle>)[^<]*)*>09<.*?<\/Vehicle>\R*
         ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

See another regex demo

It matches the same text, but is more efficient with larger texts.

edited Mar 25, 2016 at 20:11

answered Mar 25, 2016 at 19:59

Wiktor Stribiżew

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1 Comment

TPG Over a year ago

Awesome, looks like this works perfectly, even when there are multiple blocks without the >09< above. Thanks for you help!

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