html/mason parser

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

I need to parse some HTML pages, but these pages also have HTML::Mason markup in them. The <% %> tags in particular are challenging since they may have perl code containing > and < characters which may confuse strict HTML parsers.

Is is possible to make HTML::Parser (or some other module) correctly handle the extra markup? Any advice on how to go about it would also be appreciated.

Comment on html/mason parser

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Re: html/mason parser by Fletch (Bishop) on Mar 16, 2005 at 03:02 UTC
You might could twiddle a custom `HTML::Mason::Compiler` subclass (and/or `HTML::Mason::Lexer`) and spit out just the non-code chunks. I believe that the Mason book has an example you could crib from in chapter 12.	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re: html/mason parser by Joost (Canon) on Mar 16, 2005 at 00:22 UTC
Well, it's not exactly correct HTML, so your best bet would probably be, to strip out the <% %> tags beforehand. something like `#!perl local $/; $_ = <STDIN>; s/<%.?%>//sg; s/^%.//g; # i think mason also interprets lines starting with % as p +erl code. print;` [download] should do it. "What should it profit a man, if he should win a flame war, yet lose his cool?"	[reply] [d/l]
Re: html/mason parser by trammell (Priest) on Mar 16, 2005 at 03:02 UTC
Don't forget the `<& ... &>` tags...	[reply]
Re: html/mason parser by sharkey (Scribe) on Mar 16, 2005 at 17:32 UTC
I should have been more specific, that I actually want to filter the HTML pages, to add and manipulate tags. So just stripping the Mason out is a bit of an inconvenience, because I will have to find a way to put it back as well.	[reply]