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Barb Binder
Community Expert
Barb BinderCommunity Expert
Community Expert
Nov 18, 2021 3:26 PM UTC
Answered

What is the tab character in REGEX?

Hello FrameMaker friends:

 

I'm trying to find/change a series of spaces to tabs. The problem space always follows an R and four digits. For example,

R0000 followed by a space needs to be R0000 followed by a tab

 

So, this

locates the string but adds back in as R0000t and not R0000>.

 

Looking it up, \t is the REGEX character for a tab. What am I missing?

 

TIA,

~Barb

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    frameexpert
    frameexpertCorrect answer
    Community Expert
    Nov 18, 2021 3:35 PM UTC

    Barb, try this for your tab: \x08

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    6 replies

    Barb Binder
    Community Expert
    Barb BinderCommunity ExpertAuthor
    Community Expert
    Nov 19, 2021 3:51 PM UTC

    Thanks, all! 😊

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    ~Barb at Rocky Mountain Training
    K.Daube
    Community Expert
    K.DaubeCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    Nov 19, 2021 9:45 AM UTC

    This is a very old problem, because FM uses x08 as TAB character, whereas the ANSI definition is x09.

    It may well be that \t is implemented as x09...

    At least in ExtendScript RegEx \t handles the TAB character of FM correctly.

    My tests in 15.0.8.979 (aka 2019) show this:

    • \t is found in text by Simple Search, Wildcards and Regular expression
    • \t is not honoured in the replacement of the RegEx  Search which is IMHO a bug

    Tests in 16.0.3.979 (aka 2020) show this:

    • \t is found in text by Simple Search, Wildcards and Regular expression
    • \t is not honoured in the replacement . It is even worse: finding Question and replacing this with $1\t yields the single character t !!! I have reported this as bug 11044

    Edit

    From the reported bug only the part concerning handling of the TAB (\t) is correct.

    Ah, I really become old: $1 requires that the find expression contains at least one group ...

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      Community Expert
      Winfried RengCommunity Expert
      Community Expert
      Nov 19, 2021 8:41 AM UTC

      Hi Barb,

       

      You can also copy a tab from your document and paste it into the Change field.

      Then FrameMaker will replace with a tab correctly.

       

      Best regards

       

      Winfried

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        Stefan Gentz
        Legend
        Nov 18, 2021 3:46 PM UTC

        Might be a bug.

        This works: $1\u0008

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          Barb Binder
          Community Expert
          Barb BinderCommunity ExpertAuthor
          Community Expert
          Nov 18, 2021 3:45 PM UTC

          Thank you, Rick! 😊

           

          ~Barb

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          ~Barb at Rocky Mountain Training
          frameexpert
          Community Expert
          frameexpertCommunity ExpertCorrect answer
          Community Expert
          Nov 18, 2021 3:35 PM UTC

          Barb, try this for your tab: \x08

          Translate
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