RE: Using reReplace Backreference as StructKey or Argument
Jon, My recommendation AGAINST using REFind() in a loop is that I feel like it has to keep revaluating the string. The Java Pattern matcher which is what powers the REMatchGroups() UDF is designed to iterate over pattern matches and as such I assume that it is really good at it. Plus, I think that you will find that dealing with the Len[] and Pos[] arrays is going to look less than elegant. I don't think there is anyone who has even enjoyed dealing with them :) This is all theory though, I have never checked the performance. .. Ben Nadel Certified Advanced ColdFusion MX7 Developer www.bennadel.com Need ColdFusion Help? www.bennadel.com/ask-ben/ -Original Message- From: Jon Clausen [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, November 15, 2007 8:17 PM To: CF-Talk Subject: Re: Using reReplace Backreference as StructKey or Argument Ben, Thanks for the reply. I had sent a response to Ben's reply earlier today, but I guess it didn't go through. I figured the order of execution was the issue. I was hoping for a way to trick the execution order and tried writing the function call in a bunch of different ways other than the example I provided, but no dice. Ben posted a nice response, though looping with reFind() does the job for now. Thanks again, Jon On Nov 15, 2007, at 10:02 AM, Ben Doom wrote: Sorry, you can't do that. Here's why: Coldfusion hands strings off to the regex engine. CF allows you to used functions, variables, etc. in the string, but it executes them *before* the regex runs. So, in your first code sample, it's trying to find the literal key \1 in appSettings, and then passing the result as the replace value. --Ben Doom Jon Clausen wrote: I'm sure it's something simple that I'm missing, but I want to use a regex backreference as the struct key (i.e. - struct[key]) or as an argument (i.e. - function(argument) ) but I've failed in all my attempts so far. For now I've written the code out using a loop with reFind(), returning subexpressions, mid(), etc. but it seems to me there should be a way to do this using reReplace() and pass the backreference as an argument/key. Usage of evaluate() would probably be a deal-breaker since it would be less expensive to perform the loop. Here's examples of what i'm trying to do: !--- Trying to use backref passed as struct key --- cfset pageOut = reReplace(pageContent,%show:([a-zA-Z0-9_]+) %,appSettings[\1],ALL)/ !--- Trying to use backref passed as argument --- cfset pageOut = reReplace(pageContent,%getModule:([a-zA-Z0-9_]+) %,controller.getModule(\1),ALL)/ Thoughts? Jon ~| Enterprise web applications, build robust, secure scalable apps today - Try it now ColdFusion Today ColdFusion 8 beta - Build next generation apps Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Talk/message.cfm/messageid:293454 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Talk/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=89.70.4
Re: Using reReplace Backreference as StructKey or Argument
Ben, Agreed, the Len/Pos array loops are ugly and a pain to deal with. Hence my attempts to bypass all of that by finding a way to pass the backreference directly in reReplace... :-) Got around to running timers comparing reFind and your reMatchGroups function against each other.The first set ran both options together in the same function and produced significantly faster results for rematchGroups. The next 5 sets were done in a loop with both functions side by side.reMatchGroups came out ahead again on the average. When I ran each timer by itself, revmoving the other from the function, reFind() came out faster on both sets (plus a few more attempts I didn't capture in these results). While not exactly scientific, the timer results are included below (tab separated - sorry for the formatting in plain text): Timer Run Using ReFind(ms)Using RematchGroups(ms) Base Run52762879 Loop 1 42413434 Loop 2 41093284 Loop3 34403080 Loop 4 32902894 Loop 5 29943209 Solo Run 1 39754675 Solo Run 2 35013556 Average 3853.25 3376.375 Difference -14.12% 12.38% Machine Info: CF8 | 2GHz Macbook Pro 2GB RAM Based on the results, It seems that reMatchGroups has a speed advantage with a high load, but reFind seems to perform better in a single request. There were no database calls in the timers to cloud the results. Interesting stuff! Jon On Nov 16, 2007, at 8:42 AM, Ben Nadel wrote: Jon, My recommendation AGAINST using REFind() in a loop is that I feel like it has to keep revaluating the string. The Java Pattern matcher which is what powers the REMatchGroups() UDF is designed to iterate over pattern matches and as such I assume that it is really good at it. Plus, I think that you will find that dealing with the Len[] and Pos[] arrays is going to look less than elegant. I don't think there is anyone who has even enjoyed dealing with them :) This is all theory though, I have never checked the performance. .. Ben Nadel Certified Advanced ColdFusion MX7 Developer www.bennadel.com Need ColdFusion Help? www.bennadel.com/ask-ben/ -Original Message- From: Jon Clausen [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, November 15, 2007 8:17 PM To: CF-Talk Subject: Re: Using reReplace Backreference as StructKey or Argument Ben, Thanks for the reply. I had sent a response to Ben's reply earlier today, but I guess it didn't go through. I figured the order of execution was the issue. I was hoping for a way to trick the execution order and tried writing the function call in a bunch of different ways other than the example I provided, but no dice. Ben posted a nice response, though looping with reFind() does the job for now. Thanks again, Jon On Nov 15, 2007, at 10:02 AM, Ben Doom wrote: Sorry, you can't do that. Here's why: Coldfusion hands strings off to the regex engine. CF allows you to used functions, variables, etc. in the string, but it executes them *before* the regex runs. So, in your first code sample, it's trying to find the literal key \1 in appSettings, and then passing the result as the replace value. --Ben Doom Jon Clausen wrote: I'm sure it's something simple that I'm missing, but I want to use a regex backreference as the struct key (i.e. - struct[key]) or as an argument (i.e. - function(argument) ) but I've failed in all my attempts so far. For now I've written the code out using a loop with reFind(), returning subexpressions, mid(), etc. but it seems to me there should be a way to do this using reReplace() and pass the backreference as an argument/key. Usage of evaluate() would probably be a deal-breaker since it would be less expensive to perform the loop. Here's examples of what i'm trying to do: !--- Trying to use backref passed as struct key --- cfset pageOut = reReplace(pageContent,%show:([a-zA-Z0-9_]+) %,appSettings[\1],ALL)/ !--- Trying to use backref passed as argument --- cfset pageOut = reReplace(pageContent,%getModule:([a-zA-Z0-9_]+) %,controller.getModule(\1),ALL)/ Thoughts? Jon ~| Download the latest ColdFusion 8 utilities including Report Builder, plug-ins for Eclipse and Dreamweaver updates. http;//www.adobe.com/cfusion/entitlement/index.cfm?e=labs%5adobecf8%5Fbeta Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Talk/message.cfm/messageid:293474 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Talk/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=89.70.4
RE: Using reReplace Backreference as StructKey or Argument
Jon, That makes sense I suppose. The REMatchGroups() has to create some Java objects which must have some overhead. Plus it is creating arrays and structs and some grunt work. This might come out faster on big things, but for smaller things, the simplier approach might prevail. Thanks for the feedback. .. Ben Nadel Certified Advanced ColdFusion MX7 Developer www.bennadel.com Need ColdFusion Help? www.bennadel.com/ask-ben/ -Original Message- From: Jon Clausen [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Friday, November 16, 2007 11:44 AM To: CF-Talk Subject: Re: Using reReplace Backreference as StructKey or Argument Ben, Agreed, the Len/Pos array loops are ugly and a pain to deal with. Hence my attempts to bypass all of that by finding a way to pass the backreference directly in reReplace... :-) Got around to running timers comparing reFind and your reMatchGroups function against each other.The first set ran both options together in the same function and produced significantly faster results for rematchGroups. The next 5 sets were done in a loop with both functions side by side.reMatchGroups came out ahead again on the average. When I ran each timer by itself, revmoving the other from the function, reFind() came out faster on both sets (plus a few more attempts I didn't capture in these results). While not exactly scientific, the timer results are included below (tab separated - sorry for the formatting in plain text): Timer Run Using ReFind(ms)Using RematchGroups(ms) Base Run52762879 Loop 1 42413434 Loop 2 41093284 Loop3 34403080 Loop 4 32902894 Loop 5 29943209 Solo Run 1 39754675 Solo Run 2 35013556 Average 3853.25 3376.375 Difference -14.12% 12.38% Machine Info: CF8 | 2GHz Macbook Pro 2GB RAM Based on the results, It seems that reMatchGroups has a speed advantage with a high load, but reFind seems to perform better in a single request. There were no database calls in the timers to cloud the results. Interesting stuff! Jon ~| Check out the new features and enhancements in the latest product release - download the What's New PDF now http://download.macromedia.com/pub/labs/coldfusion/cf8_beta_whatsnew_052907.pdf Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Talk/message.cfm/messageid:293479 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Talk/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=11502.10531.4
RE: Using reReplace Backreference as StructKey or Argument
Jon, You cannot do that because the arguments of the REReplace() method are eveluated at the initial method execution time. Back references within a string are fine because they are evaluated within the inner working of the RERepalce() method. However, you cannot use them as part of another structure (ie, struct key) because that argument will be evaluated before the reg-ex replace actually even runs. What you need to a algorithm that doesn't really do a replace but actually returns a structure of reg-ex groups. I threw this together in hopes that it might help: http://www.bennadel.com/blog/1040-REMatchGroups-ColdFusion-User-Defined- Function.htm Or- http://bennadel.com/index.cfm?dax=blog:1040.view .. Ben Nadel Certified Advanced ColdFusion MX7 Developer www.bennadel.com Need ColdFusion Help? www.bennadel.com/ask-ben/ -Original Message- From: Jon Clausen [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, November 14, 2007 8:40 PM To: CF-Talk Subject: Using reReplace Backreference as StructKey or Argument I'm sure it's something simple that I'm missing, but I want to use a regex backreference as the struct key (i.e. - struct[key]) or as an argument (i.e. - function(argument) ) but I've failed in all my attempts so far. For now I've written the code out using a loop with reFind(), returning subexpressions, mid(), etc. but it seems to me there should be a way to do this using reReplace() and pass the backreference as an argument/key. Usage of evaluate() would probably be a deal-breaker since it would be less expensive to perform the loop. Here's examples of what i'm trying to do: !--- Trying to use backref passed as struct key --- cfset pageOut = reReplace(pageContent,%show:([a-zA-Z0-9_]+) %,appSettings[\1],ALL)/ !--- Trying to use backref passed as argument --- cfset pageOut = reReplace(pageContent,%getModule:([a-zA-Z0-9_]+) %,controller.getModule(\1),ALL)/ Thoughts? Jon ~| ColdFusion 8 - Build next generation apps today, with easy PDF and Ajax features - download now http://download.macromedia.com/pub/labs/coldfusion/cf8_beta_whatsnew_052907.pdf Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Talk/message.cfm/messageid:293397 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Talk/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=89.70.4
Re: Using reReplace Backreference as StructKey or Argument
Sorry, you can't do that. Here's why: Coldfusion hands strings off to the regex engine. CF allows you to used functions, variables, etc. in the string, but it executes them *before* the regex runs. So, in your first code sample, it's trying to find the literal key \1 in appSettings, and then passing the result as the replace value. --Ben Doom Jon Clausen wrote: I'm sure it's something simple that I'm missing, but I want to use a regex backreference as the struct key (i.e. - struct[key]) or as an argument (i.e. - function(argument) ) but I've failed in all my attempts so far. For now I've written the code out using a loop with reFind(), returning subexpressions, mid(), etc. but it seems to me there should be a way to do this using reReplace() and pass the backreference as an argument/key. Usage of evaluate() would probably be a deal-breaker since it would be less expensive to perform the loop. Here's examples of what i'm trying to do: !--- Trying to use backref passed as struct key --- cfset pageOut = reReplace(pageContent,%show:([a-zA-Z0-9_]+) %,appSettings[\1],ALL)/ !--- Trying to use backref passed as argument --- cfset pageOut = reReplace(pageContent,%getModule:([a-zA-Z0-9_]+) %,controller.getModule(\1),ALL)/ Thoughts? Jon ~| Get involved in the latest ColdFusion discussions, product development sharing, and articles on the Adobe Labs wiki. http://labs/adobe.com/wiki/index.php/ColdFusion_8 Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Talk/message.cfm/messageid:293375 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Talk/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=89.70.4
Re: Using reReplace Backreference as StructKey or Argument
Ben, Thanks! As always, you rock! I had kind of figured that the method execution order was the issue, but was hoping to find a workaround to trick the excution so that the regex backref was captured before the method was called. Very nice code and potentially very useful! I'm not entirely sure that, in my situation, it's going to be faster than using a loop with reFind() as I have currently, though I'm going to check it out with some timers later today. I'll let you know the results. What you've written, though could be tremendously useful for parsing the contents of a file and turning into workable data for reuse. In my case I'm simply replacing the user provided shorthand tokens so there's no need to retain the information after the token has been replaced. Nice work! Jon On Nov 15, 2007, at 11:35 AM, Ben Nadel wrote: Jon, You cannot do that because the arguments of the REReplace() method are eveluated at the initial method execution time. Back references within a string are fine because they are evaluated within the inner working of the RERepalce() method. However, you cannot use them as part of another structure (ie, struct key) because that argument will be evaluated before the reg-ex replace actually even runs. What you need to a algorithm that doesn't really do a replace but actually returns a structure of reg-ex groups. I threw this together in hopes that it might help: http://www.bennadel.com/blog/1040-REMatchGroups-ColdFusion-User-Defined- Function.htm Or- http://bennadel.com/index.cfm?dax=blog:1040.view .. Ben Nadel Certified Advanced ColdFusion MX7 Developer www.bennadel.com Need ColdFusion Help? www.bennadel.com/ask-ben/ -Original Message- From: Jon Clausen [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, November 14, 2007 8:40 PM To: CF-Talk Subject: Using reReplace Backreference as StructKey or Argument I'm sure it's something simple that I'm missing, but I want to use a regex backreference as the struct key (i.e. - struct[key]) or as an argument (i.e. - function(argument) ) but I've failed in all my attempts so far. For now I've written the code out using a loop with reFind(), returning subexpressions, mid(), etc. but it seems to me there should be a way to do this using reReplace() and pass the backreference as an argument/key. Usage of evaluate() would probably be a deal-breaker since it would be less expensive to perform the loop. Here's examples of what i'm trying to do: !--- Trying to use backref passed as struct key --- cfset pageOut = reReplace(pageContent,%show:([a-zA-Z0-9_]+) %,appSettings[\1],ALL)/ !--- Trying to use backref passed as argument --- cfset pageOut = reReplace(pageContent,%getModule:([a-zA-Z0-9_]+) %,controller.getModule(\1),ALL)/ Thoughts? Jon ~| Create robust enterprise, web RIAs. Upgrade to ColdFusion 8 and integrate with Adobe Flex http://www.adobe.com/products/coldfusion/flex2/?sdid=RVJP Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Talk/message.cfm/messageid:293409 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Talk/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=11502.10531.4
Re: Using reReplace Backreference as StructKey or Argument
Ben, Thanks for the reply. I had sent a response to Ben's reply earlier today, but I guess it didn't go through. I figured the order of execution was the issue. I was hoping for a way to trick the execution order and tried writing the function call in a bunch of different ways other than the example I provided, but no dice. Ben posted a nice response, though looping with reFind() does the job for now. Thanks again, Jon On Nov 15, 2007, at 10:02 AM, Ben Doom wrote: Sorry, you can't do that. Here's why: Coldfusion hands strings off to the regex engine. CF allows you to used functions, variables, etc. in the string, but it executes them *before* the regex runs. So, in your first code sample, it's trying to find the literal key \1 in appSettings, and then passing the result as the replace value. --Ben Doom Jon Clausen wrote: I'm sure it's something simple that I'm missing, but I want to use a regex backreference as the struct key (i.e. - struct[key]) or as an argument (i.e. - function(argument) ) but I've failed in all my attempts so far. For now I've written the code out using a loop with reFind(), returning subexpressions, mid(), etc. but it seems to me there should be a way to do this using reReplace() and pass the backreference as an argument/key. Usage of evaluate() would probably be a deal-breaker since it would be less expensive to perform the loop. Here's examples of what i'm trying to do: !--- Trying to use backref passed as struct key --- cfset pageOut = reReplace(pageContent,%show:([a-zA-Z0-9_]+) %,appSettings[\1],ALL)/ !--- Trying to use backref passed as argument --- cfset pageOut = reReplace(pageContent,%getModule:([a-zA-Z0-9_]+) %,controller.getModule(\1),ALL)/ Thoughts? Jon ~| Enterprise web applications, build robust, secure scalable apps today - Try it now ColdFusion Today ColdFusion 8 beta - Build next generation apps Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Talk/message.cfm/messageid:293437 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Talk/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=89.70.4
