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From: harrison@necssd.NEC.COM (Mark Harrison)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.perl
Subject: newbie question on split
Keywords: need a regular expression
Message-ID: <781@necssd.NEC.COM>
Date: 18 Apr 91 00:23:46 GMT
Reply-To: harrison@csl.dl.nec.com
Organization: NEC America Inc. SSD, Irving, TX
Lines: 21

I would like to split a line into fields, where fields are separated by
whitespace.  If a field contains whitespace, It should be enclosed in
double quotes.  If a field needs a double quote, it should backslash
escape it.  EG,

	field1	field2		field3
	field1	"field 2"	"field \"3\""

What I have now:

	($key, $str, $cmd) = split("[ \t]+");

1. What RE should I use for handling double quotes?
2. What RE should I use for handling double quotes with embedded quotes?
3. Is there a better way to do this?

Thanks in advance...
-- 
Mark Harrison             harrison@ssd.dl.nec.com
(214)518-5050             {necntc, cs.utexas.edu}!necssd!harrison
standard disclaimers apply...