Re: How do I search for pattern A followed by NOT pattern A ?

On 11/01/11 06:03, RJA wrote:
> if I have the buffer below,
>
> ppppp 1 2 3 4 5
> ppppp 1 2 3 4 5
> ppppv 1 2 3 4 5
> ppppp 1 2 3 4 5
>
> I can type the search
>
> /\(ppppp\).*\n\1.*
>
> which will match against the first two lines
>
> However, I want to pick out lines 2 and 3. How can I do that ?

For this particular case, you can search for

^\(.....\).*\n\1\@!

Note that the "\@!" matches the previous atom, so if you're doing
something more complex than the single "\1" atom, you need to
wrap it in grouping-parens, whether capturing "\(...\)" or
non-capturing "\%(...\)".

Also note that the 4th (last) line will be matched because the
following line doesn't start with the pattern on the current
line. If you want to mitigate, just change the pattern to

^\(.....\).*\n\1\@!.....

to assert there are 5 things there. Thosse "....." could also be
written as ".\{5}" for what it's worth.

For more reading, you can

:help /\@!

and the surrounding sections regarding the Perl-ish tokens.

-tim

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