Split by spaces but not when phrase is inside quotes...

[afrinspray@gmail.com]

I'm writing a function that parses a nested list string that might look
like this:
( "HELLO WORLD!" 1231231 awesome ( 1 2 ) )

I wrote the logic already and it starts by splitting the string by the
space character (or tab or newline).
ex... $tklist = preg_split("/\s|\n|\t/", $str);

This works except in the string case, where "HELLO WORLD!" should not
be two parts. How do I split by spaces but keep phrases inside quotes
in tact? Is there an easy way to do this?

Thanks,
Mike

[Tony]

Re: Split by spaces but not when phrase is inside quotes...

<afrinspray@gma il.com> wrote in message
news:1116281172 .350907.44840@g 43g2000cwa.goog legroups.com...[color=blue]
> I'm writing a function that parses a nested list string that might look
> like this:
> ( "HELLO WORLD!" 1231231 awesome ( 1 2 ) )
>
> I wrote the logic already and it starts by splitting the string by the
> space character (or tab or newline).
> ex... $tklist = preg_split("/\s|\n|\t/", $str);
>
> This works except in the string case, where "HELLO WORLD!" should not
> be two parts. How do I split by spaces but keep phrases inside quotes
> in tact? Is there an easy way to do this?[/color]

Remove the substrings surrounded by quotes first. Then don't parse the
phrases that were enclosed - only split the rest of the string.

[afrinspray]

Re: Split by spaces but not when phrase is inside quotes...

Brilliant. Thanks.

Mike