From mboxrd@z Thu Jan  1 00:00:00 1970
Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail
From: Gregory Benjamin <gregb@laserlab.com>
Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.help
Subject: Help with regex including newline
Date: Wed, 28 Mar 2012 15:03:13 -0700
Message-ID: <20120328220313.GA1859@dbn66.laserlab.com>
NNTP-Posting-Host: plane.gmane.org
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
X-Trace: dough.gmane.org 1332982422 10025 80.91.229.3 (29 Mar 2012 00:53:42 GMT)
X-Complaints-To: usenet@dough.gmane.org
NNTP-Posting-Date: Thu, 29 Mar 2012 00:53:42 +0000 (UTC)
To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
Original-X-From: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Thu Mar 29 02:53:42 2012
Return-path: <help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org>
Envelope-to: geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org
Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([208.118.235.17])
	by plane.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.69)
	(envelope-from <help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org>)
	id 1SD3cT-0002X0-TQ
	for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Thu, 29 Mar 2012 02:53:42 +0200
Original-Received: from localhost ([::1]:56375 helo=lists.gnu.org)
	by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71)
	(envelope-from <help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org>)
	id 1SD3cT-0001lj-AW
	for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Wed, 28 Mar 2012 20:53:41 -0400
Original-Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([208.118.235.92]:34488)
	by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71)
	(envelope-from <gregb@laserlab.com>) id 1SD2bb-00058U-ML
	for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Wed, 28 Mar 2012 19:48:45 -0400
Original-Received: from Debian-exim by eggs.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.71)
	(envelope-from <gregb@laserlab.com>) id 1SD0xX-0002Yc-OR
	for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Wed, 28 Mar 2012 18:03:17 -0400
Original-Received: from mail.laserlab.com ([69.229.78.89]:45564 helo=dbn66.laserlab.com)
	by eggs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71)
	(envelope-from <gregb@laserlab.com>) id 1SD0xX-0002Xk-Hm
	for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Wed, 28 Mar 2012 18:03:15 -0400
Original-Received: by dbn66.laserlab.com (Postfix, from userid 1001)
	id 48A8320E1A2; Wed, 28 Mar 2012 15:03:13 -0700 (PDT)
Content-Disposition: inline
User-Agent: Mutt/1.5.20 (2009-06-14)
X-detected-operating-system: by eggs.gnu.org: GNU/Linux 2.6 (newer, 3)
X-Received-From: 69.229.78.89
X-BeenThere: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.14
Precedence: list
List-Id: Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor <help-gnu-emacs.gnu.org>
List-Unsubscribe: <https://lists.gnu.org/mailman/options/help-gnu-emacs>,
	<mailto:help-gnu-emacs-request@gnu.org?subject=unsubscribe>
List-Archive: <http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/help-gnu-emacs>
List-Post: <mailto:help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
List-Help: <mailto:help-gnu-emacs-request@gnu.org?subject=help>
List-Subscribe: <https://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/help-gnu-emacs>,
	<mailto:help-gnu-emacs-request@gnu.org?subject=subscribe>
Errors-To: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org
Original-Sender: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org
Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.help:84194
Archived-At: <http://permalink.gmane.org/gmane.emacs.help/84194>

I've been struggling with this for more than an hour...

I'm using GNU Emacs 24.0.93.2

Given the following text in a buffer:

<!-- this is some garbage that I want to match and
strip out of the buffer. It may span many lines before
reaching the end. -->

I wish to use M-x replace-regexp to delete the entire pattern,
including the opening '<' and closing '>'.

Using M-x re-builder, I came up with the following regexp:

<!--\(.\|^j\)*?-->

Note that the '^j' is actually entered by typing 'C-q C-j'.

This regular expression highlights the text correctly in re-builder,
but when I attempt to use it with M-x replace-regexp, it doesn't match
anything. I've tried a number of variations to no avail.

The intent of the regular expression is: "Match <!-- followed by
either any character that isn't a newline, or the newline character,
up to -->, but don't match past the > char." This last bit is
controlled by using non-greedy matching *? instead of the usual *.

Best,
Greg