From: Ethan C. Eldridge
Subject: Search and Replace in Lisp
Date: 
Message-ID: <8777q4$nv715@news1.gtech.com>
Hello,

I'm new to lisp and am trying to customize Emacs.  I'd like the ability to
pass a string to a function and do a search-and-replace on that string.

All the built-in Emacs lisp functions I can find (e.g. replace-string,
replace-match), perform a search-and-replace on the last text searched for
in the text buffer, rather than a string I pass.  Is there a lisp function
that can do a search-and-replace on a string I pass, or do I have to build
my own?

Any assistance provided is much appreciated!

Thanks,
Ethan
From: Barry Margolin
Subject: Re: Search and Replace in Lisp
Date: 
Message-ID: <OjHl4.29$xI3.543@burlma1-snr2>
In article <············@news1.gtech.com>,
Ethan C. Eldridge <··············@gtech.com> wrote:
>I'm new to lisp and am trying to customize Emacs.  I'd like the ability to
>pass a string to a function and do a search-and-replace on that string.

Emacs Lisp questions are best asked in the Emacs newsgroups, either
comp.emacs or gnu.emacs.help.

>All the built-in Emacs lisp functions I can find (e.g. replace-string,
>replace-match), perform a search-and-replace on the last text searched for
>in the text buffer, rather than a string I pass.  Is there a lisp function
>that can do a search-and-replace on a string I pass, or do I have to build
>my own?

string-match will search for a regexp in a string you supply.  You can then
use match-beginning and match-end to get the indices of the start and end
of the match, and use substring and concat to build a new string based on
that.

-- 
Barry Margolin, ······@bbnplanet.com
GTE Internetworking, Powered by BBN, Burlington, MA
*** DON'T SEND TECHNICAL QUESTIONS DIRECTLY TO ME, post them to newsgroups.
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