Using Regex in Notepad++ to find and append to selection

Question

I have a CSV text file in a similar layout to below

COL1, COL2, COL3, ADDRESS1, COL5, COL6, COL7
dsada34sdsad5asdas, dasd32sadasd232as, fioejwfw667eoefw, 1 Terrace Lane, goirgngniogri,giergrngernn, gireneogner

I am trying to use a regex to put quotation marks around everything in ADDRESS1, so the only way I can seem to find the contents between is working out that after the 3rd comma is where my address starts and 3 commas back from the end is where my address ends.

I've currently used ^([^,]),([^,]),([^,]*), which selects from the start of each line to the 3rd comma. But replacing this then deletes all of that selection rather than appending a " mark to the start of address. Then I haven't quite figured out how to do the same but in reverse from the end of each line so I assume it will be a 2-step process.

UPDATE

ewwefeuuiofew99,6743964398hfjkef,gfbweifgbewifew665465,PARTOFADDRESS1,,,,, PARTOFADDRESS2,,, PARTOFADDRESS3,PARTOFADDRESS4, PARTOFADDRESS5, PARTOFADDRESS6,098304830gdsgsd,2014-08-08 00:00,,Yes

As you can see there are alot of commas floating throughout the data (unfortunately that's how I got it) so in your example it only highlights PARTOFADDRESS1.

Toto · Accepted Answer · 2015-10-13 09:07:52Z

2

Have a try with:

Find what: ^((?:[^,]+,){3})([^,]+)
Replace with: $1"$2"

update according to comment:

Is that what you want?

Find what: ^((?:[^,]+,){3})(.+)((?:,[^,]*){3})$
Replace with: $1"$2"$3

edited Oct 13, 2015 at 9:07

answered Oct 13, 2015 at 8:58

Toto

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3 Comments

Dan W Over a year ago

Works to an extent, let me try to clarify my dataset a bit more. I will amend my question with a new example

Dan W Over a year ago

I believe that it's 3 forward and 4 commas back from the end.

Dan W Over a year ago

Using your edited version I just updated the second number to 4 and it seems to do what I want! Excellent!

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