You could have a look at yaml, a terse yet powerful non-markup language. There is even a YAML module.

You example would look like:

stage-direction :Enter Fred, stage right
speech :
  character: Fred
  text: >
    Hey everyone, what's up?
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On a line similar to YAML, there is also SOX. But no luck, the implementation is java based.

-- stefp -- check out TeXmacs wiki

I second graff's suggestion. Why not just use XML, if you're going to be marking it up anyways?

Once you put it in XML, you can do bunch of cool things, plus you get the bonus of not having to write yet another parser.

  use XML::LibXML;
  my $parser = XML::LibXML->new();
  my $xml    = $parser->parse_file( '/path/to/file' );
  ## find all <speech>..
  foreach my $speech ( $xml->findnodes( '/script/speech' ) {
     ....
  }

  ## find all speech by Romeo (assuming:
  ##  <speech><character>Romeo</character><text>....</text></speech>
  ## )
  foreach my $romeo_speech ( $xml->findnodes( '/script/speech/[charact
+er = "Romeo"]' ) ) {
      ....
  }

  ## etc...
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<stage right> Enter Juliet
<speech Juliet> Romeo! Romeo! 
Where the heck are you!
<audience> claps.
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while (<>) {
   if (/^<(.+?)>(.*)$/i) {
      $tag = $1;
      $part{$tag} .= $2;
   }
   else {
      $part{$tag} .= $_;
   }
}
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If/when you get around making this data portable/sharable -- trust me, there are many who could find untold uses for it, if you're willing to make it available -- you'll really want to have it in XML anyway, so why not just do it that way now?

POD

_14k4 - perlmonks@poorheart.com (www.poorheart.com)

Then with your regex, you could base it on whatever class or id you've assigned to your lines.

Caveat: I don't know XML or if this would interfere with it, but it would probably do what you want quickly and without a whole lot of hassle.

Hope that helps!

Some people fall from grace. I prefer a running start...

If you aren't going to go with a pre-defined format, make sure your format has strict guidelines and your programs adhere to them.

I suggest using a combination of tabs and newlines (CR or LF) to delimit certain areas.

I've used ## and \t\t\n as delimiters before. When it comes down to the wire, whatever works well (and reliably) is your best option.

You can use any kind of delimiter, just as long as the delimiter is stripped/replaced before you add it to your file, or else you'll break the format and your program.

In defense of module-driven apps, XML::* mods are worth using. But if you can't, you can't. Good luck.

John J Reiser
newrisedesigns.com

<act number="2">
  <stage-direction character="Fred">
    Enter, stage right
  </stage-direction>
  <dialogue character="Fred">
    Man, it's hot out there!
  </dialogue>
  <stage-direction character="Fred">
    Wipe forehead
  </stage-direction>
</act>
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I think my aversion to learning XML is really an aversion to learning XSLT -- I read a bit of the O'Relly book and it just seemed like page after page of "know how to do a 'for' loop? Well it's possible, though incredibly complicated and wordy, to do in XSLT".

I've been learning Perl and various other things like JavaScript for ages, and I haven't got the room in my brain to start learning a new and forbidding language.

I might try to do it with XML, but not using XSLT, using the module as suggested by Lestrrat.

After all, even if I ended up writing my own really bad parser, just because it's not being read by a formal XML parser, doesn't mean it couldn't be valid XML in case someone else wanted it...
--

($_='jjjuuusssttt annootthheer
     pppeeerrrlll haaaccckkeer')=~y/a-z//s;print;
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XSLT isn't quite as bad as it looks at first glance. I haven't seen the O'Reily book myself, but I did manage to get a decent start from the tutorial at W3Schools. I leatned enough to replace some pretty nasty looping structures in some of my scripts with much more elegant (and faster) XSL transforms using XML::LibXML and XML::LibXSLT.

<xsl:rattus/>