Re^4: In search of a better way to trim string length

in reply to Re^3: In search of a better way to trim string length
in thread In search of a better way to trim string

This is cool but it suffers from a problem that the first one I wrote did too. Give it:

my $mouse = 'This is a story about mice, "I dint know mice were so sma
+rt."';
print trimTo($mouse,30), "\n";
[download]

And you can get back things like: This is a story about mice,... The comma (or semi-color, period, quote, etc) is a bit jarring.

This is a recent stab I've ended up using but I would love to see other ideas/answers/hybrids:

sub chop_to_size {
    my ($text, $length) = @_;
    return $text if length $text < $length;
    # make room for ellipsis
    my $chop = $length - 3;
    $text =~ s/^\s*(.{$chop})\s*.+$/$1/;
    $text =~ s/[\s[:punct:]]+$//;
    $text .= "...";
    $text;
}
[download]

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Re^5: In search of a better way to trim string length by dragonchild (Archbishop) on Jul 19, 2004 at 19:37 UTC
The issue arises from what constitutes a "word". The basic definition is `@words = split ' ', $line;`, which works in most cases. However, it's arguable that a better definition could be `@words = $line =~ /(\b\w+(?:['-]\w+)\b)/;`. Of course, you're now depending on the definition of \w, which includes underscore and doesn't include apostrophe or hyphen. shrugs YMMV a huge amount. Parsing any natural language is much harder than parsing Perl which, as everyone knows, can't be done in Perl. Good luck! I mean it. ------ We are the carpenters and bricklayers of the Information Age. Then there are Damian modules.... sigh* ... that's not about being less-lazy -- that's about being on some really good drugs -- you know, there is no spoon.* - flyingmoose I shouldn't have to say this, but any code, unless otherwise stated, is untested	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re^5: In search of a better way to trim string length by BrowserUk (Patriarch) on Jul 19, 2004 at 20:12 UTC
According to a writer's guide grammatically, if a quote is truncated after a commas or a full stop, the comma or fullstop should be left in place with no intervening spacing. Blah blah blah,... Blah blah blah.... It's an interesting problem though. I think on it and get back to you:) Examine what is said, not who speaks. "Efficiency is intelligent laziness." -David Dunham "Think for yourself!" - Abigail "Memory, processor, disk in that order on the hardware side. Algorithm, algoritm, algorithm on the code side." - tachyon	[reply]

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