Without knowing this, we can't know whether to break   MOTEL GOLDEN LEEUW <A225> into   (MOTEL)()(GOLDEN LEEUW <A225>) or   (MOTEL GOLDEN LEEUW)()(<A225>) Assuming for a moment that the latter is the correct way to divide the field, you could do something like

while ( <DATA> ) {
    if ( /^(.*)\s*($Pred_re)\s*(.*)$/ ) {
        ($name,$pred,$unknown) = ($1, $2, $3);
    } else {
        ($name,$unknown,$pred) = /^(.*)\s*(\S*)$/;
    }
}
[download]

Updated: to tweak the whitespace matching.

Update 2: Bah. Forget the feeble effort above.

my $Prep_Re=join '|',('VAN DER','VAN DE','DEN','DE','VAN');

while ( <DATA> ) {
    chomp;
    if ( /^(.*)\s+($Prep_Re)\b\s*(.*)$/ ) {
        ($name, $prep, $other) = ($1, $2, $3);
    }
    elsif ( /^(.*)\s+($Prep_Re)\s*$/ ) {
        ($name, $prep, $other) = ($1, $2, "");
    }
    elsif ( /^(.*)\b\s+(\S+)$/ ) {
        ($name, $prep, $other) = ($1, "", $2);
    }
    else {
        ($name, $prep, $other) = ($_, "", "");
    }
    print "$name|$prep|$other\n";
}

__DATA__
WINTER DE   <A240>
ZANDEN VAN DER     ŤAť
JENSEN  230
WOODHEAD  <D>
BRINK    130,-
HEYDIER DEN  <240>
SMITSER  (4X115PJ)
LINDEN VAN DER
MOTEL GOLDEN LEEUW <A225>
__END__
WINTER|DE|<A240>
ZANDEN|VAN DER|ŤAť
JENSEN||230
WOODHEAD||<D>
BRINK||130,-
HEYDIER|DEN|<240>
SMITSER||(4X115PJ)
LINDEN|VAN DER|
MOTEL GOLDEN LEEUW||<A225>
[download]

Okay, I`ll reply here, might be easier :) Results:

WINTER|DE|<A240>            <- Parsed correctly
ZANDEN VAN |DE|R ŤAť        <- should be: ZANDEN|VAN DER|ŤAť
JENSEN  230||               <- should be: JENSEN||230
WOODHEAD  <D>||             <- should be: WOODHEAD||<D>
BRINK    130,-||            <- should be: BRINK||130,-
HEYDIER |DEN|<240>          <- Parsed correctly
SMITSER (4X115PJ)||         <- should be: SMITSER||(4X115PJ)
LINDEN VAN |DE|R            <- should be: LINDEN|VAN DER|
MOTEL GOL|DEN|LEEUW <A225>  <- should be: MOTEL GOLDEN LEEUW||<A225>
[download]

does this help ? ... I will try to find a larger data set...

btw, this is the result of my original code:


WINTER|DE| <A240>
ZANDEN|VAN DER| ŤAť
JENSEN||230
WOODHEAD||<D>
BRINK||130,-
HEYDIER|DEN| <240>
SMITSER||(4X115PJ)
LINDEN|VAN DER|
MOTEL GOLDEN LEEUW||<A225>
[download]


</code>
GreetZ!,

ChOas

print "profeth still\n" if /bird|devil/;

ChOas

Names CAN have embeded spaces, and I THINK that the unknown field always starts with [^A-Z] ...

Hmm, unless you're certain about that [^A-Z] thing, it sounds like you're screwed.

There's no clear way to parse records that don't contain a "prependition" because you can never be sure where the name ends, consider the most simple example...

A B

There are two totally valid parsings for this.

#!/usr/bin/perl -w
use strict;

my $Prep_Re = join '|',('VAN DER','VAN DE','DEN','DE','VAN');

while (<DATA>) {
  s/\s{2,}/ /g;
  s/^\s*(.*?)\s*$/$1/;

  if ( /(.+?) ($Prep_Re) ?((?:[^A-Za-z].*)?)/ ) {
    my ($Name,$Prep,$Unknown) = ($1,$2,$3);
    print "$Name == $Prep == $Unknown\n";
  }
  elsif ( /(.+) ([^A-Za-z].*)?/ ) {
    my ($Name,$Prep,$Unknown) = ($1,'',$2);
    print "$Name == $Prep == $Unknown\n";
  }
  else {
    print "No idea for $_\n";
  }
}
__DATA__
WINTER DE   <A240>
ZANDEN VAN DER     ŤAť
JENSEN  230
WOODHEAD  <D>
BRINK    130,-
HEYDIER DEN  <240>
SMITSER  (4X115PJ)
LINDEN VAN DER
MOTEL GOLDEN LEEUW <A225>
[download]

.02

ps - the nearest word I could find was cognomen, but I bet that's not right either :)

--
seek(JOB,$$LA,0);

Abigail

I did come up with a solution that isn't regex oriented, but I think it will work for all cases. It could probably be tightened a bit, although the regex way may be better in the end.

#!/usr/bin/perl -w

use strict;

my $temp='';
my $flag=0;

print "Name\t\tPrependition\t\tWhatever\n";
while (<DATA>)
{
 chomp;
 my @line = split('\s+',$_);

 for my $i(0..$#line){
                 if ((length($line[$i])<4)&&
                    ($line[$i] =~ m/[A-Z][A-Z]+/o)){
                                                   $temp .= $line[$i];
                                                   $line[$i] = '*' if 
+$flag;
                                                   $line[$i] = '' if !
+$flag;
                                                   $flag = 1;
                                                   $temp .= ' ';
                                                   }
                 }
                 $flag = 0;
 for my $i(0..$#line){
                      print "$temp\t" if $line[$i] eq '';
                      print "$line[$i]\t" unless $line[$i] eq '*';;
                      }
 print "\n";
 $temp = '';
 }


__DATA__
WINTER DE   <A240>
ZANDEN VAN DER     ŤAť
JENSEN  230
WOODHEAD  <D>
BRINK    130,-
HEYDIER DEN  <240>
SMITSER  (4X115PJ)
LINDEN VAN DER
MOTEL GOLDEN LEEUW <A225>
[download]

Hope that helps!

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

• What is your field seperator? (ie: can white spaces appear in names?)
• What are the cases you can think of where it won't work
• Is "MOTEL GOLDEN LEEUW" a valid name? How do you guys pick names in the Netherlands -- throw a box of poetry magnets in the air and see what sticks to the light fixtures?

How do you guys pick names in the Netherlands -- 
throw a box of poetry magnets in the air and see what 
sticks to the light fixtures?
[download]

That's a bit rude, or at least culturally insensitive.

Is "MOTEL GOLDEN LEEUW" a valid name? That's the name of a motel, surely. What's weird about that?

If all this data is just in the same field, I think my pseudocode would be:

while (<DATA>){
$name = everything up to the first space.
$rest = everything else
if ($rest starts with one of the "van"-type prepositions){
  deal with it
} else {
  print "can't parse this one into a name: $_"
}
}
[download]


--


($_='jjjuuusssttt annootthheer
     pppeeerrrlll haaaccckkeer')=~y/a-z//s;print;
[download]

That's a bit rude, or at least culturally insensitive.

chalk it up to cultural insensitivity i guess, humor isn't neccessarily universal.

Is "MOTEL GOLDEN LEEUW" a valid name?

That's the name of a motel, surely. What's weird about that?

no, not surely ... he said he was dealing with surnames, which is what prompted my question (it didn't seem like a name, which is why I wasn't clear how that line should be parsed)