Word wrapping using a regex.

Hi Monks!
I'm trying to have a word wrapping using a regex in Perl. What I would like is about every 50 characters or so to check for the next white-space occurrence and replace that space with a new line, and then do this for the whole string. I'd like to avoid looping one character at a time or using substr or placing the value into an array if possible. The code sample I have works, I'd like one's option and suggestion if there is a better way or a better regular expression to accomplish this.
Here is the code:

#!/usr/bin/perl -w

use strict;

my $string = 'I'm trying to have a word wrapping using a regex in Perl
+. What I would like is about every 50 characters 
or so to check for the next white-space occurrence and replace that sp
+ace with a newline, and then do this for the whole string. 
I'd like to avoid looping one character at a time or using substr or p
+lacing the value into an array if possible.
The code sample I have works, I'd like someone option and suggestion i
+s there a better way or better regular expression to accomplish this.
+';

$string =~ s/(.{1,50}\S|\S+)\s+/$1\n/mg;

print "$string\n";
exit;
[download]

Thanks for looking!

Comment on Word wrapping using a regex. Download Code
Re: Word wrapping using a regex. by MidLifeXis (Prior) on Dec 06, 2011 at 16:53 UTC
Would Text::Wrap be a reasonable solution, or must you use a regexp? --MidLifeXis	[reply]
Re^2: Word wrapping using a regex. by Anonymous Monk on Dec 06, 2011 at 18:09 UTC
Yeah, I have to use regexp!	[reply]
Re^3: Word wrapping using a regex. by Anonymous Monk on Dec 06, 2011 at 19:53 UTC
Smells like homework.	[reply]
Re^3: Word wrapping using a regex. by toolic (Chancellor) on Dec 06, 2011 at 20:02 UTC
Look at the regexes in the Text::Wrap source code: `perldoc -m Text::Wrap` [download]	[reply] [d/l]
Re: Word wrapping using a regex. by TJPride (Pilgrim) on Dec 06, 2011 at 22:07 UTC
Your regex is obviously not working properly, because it prints beyond the boundary of 50 characters. Here's another option: use strict; use warnings; my $string = "I'm trying to have a word wrapping using a regex in Perl +. What I would like is about every 50 characters or so to check for +the next white-space occurrence and replace that space with a newline +, and then do this for the whole string. I'd like to avoid looping o +ne character at a time or using substr or placing the value into an a +rray if possible. The code sample I have works, I'd like someone opti +on and suggestion is there a better way or better regular expression +to accomplish this."; print '1234567890'x5 . "\n"; print wrap($string, 50) . "\n"; sub wrap { my ($s, $wrap) = @_; my (@lines, $line); while (length $s > $wrap) { ### Take one extra character so we can see if ### we're wrapping inside a word or not $line = substr($s, 0, $wrap+1); $line =~ s/\s+(\S*)$//; push @lines, $line; ### Add any word fragments back on $s = $1 . substr($s, $wrap); $s =~ s/^\s+//; } return join "\n", @lines; } [download]	[reply] [d/l]
Re^2: Word wrapping using a regex. by Additude (Initiate) on Nov 14, 2012 at 14:26 UTC
I think to make this work we need to add another line at the end to tell it what to do with the last of the string that is less than $wrap. `sub wrap { my ($s, $wrap) = @_; my (@lines, $line); while (length $s > $wrap) { ### Take one extra character so we can see if ### we're wrapping inside a word or not $line = substr($s, 0, $wrap+1); $line =~ s/\s+(\S*)$//; push @lines, $line; ### Add any word fragments back on $s = $1 . substr($s, $wrap); $s =~ s/^\s+//; } push @lines, $s; ## Adds the the last of the $s string to @lines return join "\n", @lines; }` [download]	[reply] [d/l]


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Word wrapping using a regex.

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