[clisp-list] Regexps w/clisp

[Chris H. <ha...@ve...>]

Now that I have successfully built my clisp 2.29 w/regexp and tried a
few out, I must admit to a little bafflement.

Based on the information I've been able to gather, the clisp regexp
package uses the host OS's regexp engine, and on FreeBSD and Debian,
from what I can find, that is also what grep uses - on both Debian and
FreeBSD, grep is GNU grep.

So if I can match a pattern using grep -E (aka egrep?) on a file, it
seems reasonable to expect that the same pattern should work similarly
when moved into a regexp-quoted regex-compiled with :EXTENDED and run
against that same file.

Except it doesn't seem to.  Using the pattern '<[/]?issuer(.*)?>' grep
will pick out each appropriate line in the following data on both
platforms:

    <notSubjectToSection16>0</notSubjectToSection16>

    <issuer>
        <issuerCik>0000351077</issuerCik>
        <issuerName>CITIZENS BANKING CORP</issuerName>
        <issuerTradingSymbol>CBCF</issuerTradingSymbol>
    </issuer>

    <reportingOwner>

while clisp returns NIL.  It is my understanding that clisp should
return the 'co-ordinates' of at least the leading tags, and for now
that is OK - I am trying to learn the clisp regex 'flavor'.

I've tried quoting by hand as well, since regexp-quote produces this:
"<\\[/\\]?issuer(\\.\\*)+>", i.e., ?()+ don't seem to be considered
special.  Hand quoting didn't seem to make any difference in this
case, though sometimes grouping w/parens does seem to work in clisp.

I already have some useful regexes to do what I want on this data that
run in production under awk and/or guile - I can pretty much just cut
and paste expressions from one to the other.

I realize that regexes don't always 'port' well (heh!), but I *would*
like to use clisp for this, so any insight anybody has to offer would
be much appreciated.

I've already read everything I could find in the clisp Extensions
pages, so any pointers to further information would also be warmly
received.

Aloha,
+Chris

--=20
Good judgment comes from experience. Experience comes from bad
judgment.
- Jim Horning