Remove Double Spacing

dbrock has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

Hello, I have a text file that has become double spaced. Whay would be the best way to remove the doulble char spacing globally in the text file...
------example of text file UTF-16------

D r i v e   a n d   m e d i a   i n f o r m a t i o n   f r o m   m e 
+d i a   m o u n t : 
 
 R o b o t i c   L i b r a r y   N a m e :   C O M P A Q   1 
 
 D r i v e   N a m e :   C O M P A Q   1 
 
 S l o t :   1 
 
 M e d i a   L a b e l :   D S W 0 0 0 
 
 M e d i a   G U I D :   { 4 3 1 B 0 3 D E - 1 C 4 9 - 1 1 D 4 - B 2 1
+ C - 0 0 5 0 8 B C A 3 A 6 8 } 
 
 O v e r w r i t e   P r o t e c t e d   U n t i l :   1 / 3 0 / 2 0 0
+ 5   3 : 1 4 : 4 1   A M 
 
 A p p e n d a b l e   U n t i l :   1 2 / 3 1 / 9 9 9 9   1 2 : 0 0 :
+ 0 0   A M 
 
 T a r g e t e d   M e d i a   S e t   N a m e :   D a i l y
[download]

I have been attampting to use something like this: s/\s\w//g;

Comment on Remove Double Spacing Select or Download Code

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Re: Remove Double Spacing by theorbtwo (Prior) on Jan 28, 2005 at 19:07 UTC
Are you sure those are really spaces, and not null bytes? (Try asking Data::Dumper to dump it.) If those are null bytes, the file is in UTF-16, and you're reading it as if it were in latin-1. If you're using perl 5.8, you can simply tell Perl that the file is in utf16: `binmode($fh, ':encoding(utf-16)')`. If you're under 5.6, it's a hair more complicated -- you need to first read in the data, then use Encode to "decode" it from utf-16 to perl's internal format. `$useable=decode('utf-16', $encoded);`. Warning: Unless otherwise stated, code is untested. Do not use without understanding. Code is posted in the hopes it is useful, but without warranty. All copyrights are relinquished into the public domain unless otherwise stated. I am not an angel. I am capable of error, and err on a fairly regular basis. If I made a mistake, please let me know (such as by replying to this node).	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re: Remove Double Spacing by dragonchild (Archbishop) on Jan 28, 2005 at 19:05 UTC
`s/\s(?=\S)//gms;` should work. Being right, does not endow the right to be rude; politeness costs nothing. Being unknowing, is not the same as being stupid. Expressing a contrary opinion, whether to the individual or the group, is more often a sign of deeper thought than of cantankerous belligerence. Do not mistake your goals as the only goals; your opinion as the only opinion; your confidence as correctness. Saying you know better is not the same as explaining you know better.	[reply] [d/l]
Re: Remove Double Spacing by BUU (Prior) on Jan 28, 2005 at 19:04 UTC
`s/(?<=\w) (?=\w)//g; s/\n\n/\n/g; s/ / /g;` [download] Seems to work on the sample.	[reply] [d/l]
Re^2: Remove Double Spacing by mpeters (Chaplain) on Jan 28, 2005 at 19:07 UTC
This: `s/(?<=\w) (?=\w)//g;` should probably be `s/(?<=\S) (?=\S)//g;` since there are other characters besides alphanumeric.	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re: Remove Double Spacing by nobull (Friar) on Jan 29, 2005 at 10:08 UTC
Are you sure it's really double-spaced not UTF16? To open UTF16 in Perl5.8 `use Enocde; open my $fh, '<:encoding(utf16)', 'somefile' or die $!;` [download] Update: Sorry, I'd missed the fact that theorbtwo had already given a better answer along the same lines.	[reply] [d/l]
Re^2: Remove Double Spacing by dbrock (Sexton) on Jan 31, 2005 at 20:16 UTC
The origional Document is UTF16 I started with a UTF16 .XML file I'm trying to Strip out all of the XML tags and parse the text using regex expressions... DBrock...	[reply]
Re: Remove Double Spacing by ambrus (Abbot) on Jan 28, 2005 at 21:26 UTC
~~`perl -wpe 's/(.)\s/$1/g' infile > outfile`~~ Update: that doesn't quite work, sorry.	[reply] [d/l]