Regex to compare \nd markup in two projects

Question

The following Regex will allow you to compare two projects with the divine name markup \nd …\nd* in Paratext Find and using Remove From List, to see where the number of instances in a verse differ. Settings need to be without any restrictions. It will not work if Match Only in Verse Text is checked.

regex:(?<=\\v\s\S+\s)((?!\\(v|m?s|nd)).)*(\\nd [^\\]*?\\nd\*)){1,1}((?!\\(v|m?s|nd|c)).)*(?=\\(v|s|c)|\Z)

This regex allows you to find verses with a specified number of \nd spans in the text:

• {1,1} one and only one
• {1} exactly one (same as above)
• {2,} two or more
• {0,0} None

It does not find \nd markup in section headings nor will it find \+nd markup

Issues

• Since it will not find \+nd markup it will not find \+nd in regular text (rare).
• It will not find \nd in a partial verse that follows a section heading (rare).

The following Regex will find txt in \+nd …\+nd* spans in regular text and footnotes: .

regex:(?<=\\v\s\S+\s)(((?!\\(v|m?s|\+nd)).)*(\\\+?nd [^\\]*?\\\+?nd\*)){1,1}((?!\\(v|m?s|\+nd)).)*(?=\\(v|m?s)|\Z)

Issues

• Since it will find \+nd markup it will find \+nd in footnotes (common).

If we want to use this to compare an English translation that uses \nd markup with a translation that uses a unique unmarked word for YHWH, we can add the word to the find. For French we will look for Eternel

regex:(?<=\\v\s\S+\s)(((?!\\(v|m?s|nd)|Eternel).)*(\\\+?nd [^\\]*?\\\+?nd\*|Eternel)){1,1}((?!\\(v|m?s|nd)|Eternel).)*(?=\\v|m?s)|\Z)

Since Eternel also occurs in footnotes we want to skip finding the text in footnotes. The following Schema will allow you skip text (such as a footnote span) when matching:

schema:(?<=<start>)(((?!<selector>).)*((<skipSpan>((?!<selector>).)*)*<requiredSpan>)){Min,Max}((?!<selector>).)*(<skipSpan>((?!<selector>).)*)*(?=<end>|\Z)

For the <selector> see: Regex Examples: Matching Whole Lines of Text That Satisfy Certain Requirements

If your condition is that a line should not contain something, use negative lookahead. ^((?!regexp).)*$ matches a complete line that does not match regexp.

Let’s apply this to skipping text in footnotes. We are required to match \nd and \+nd spans and Eternel:

<start>         \\v\s\S+\s                         ; Start at verse
<end>           \\(v|m?s)                          ; End at verse or section heading 
<end>|\Z        \\(v|m?s)|\Z                       ; For final context add \Z to select end of Chapter
<requiredStart> \\\+?nd|Eternel                    ; \nd markup optionally embedded and "Eternel"
<requiredSpan>  (\\\+?nd [^\\]*?\\\+?nd\*|Eternel) ; The entire \nd phrase or "Eternel"
<skipStart>     \\f\s                              ; Beginning of a footnote
<skipSpan>      (\\f\s((?!\\f\*).)*\\f\*)          ; The entire footnote
<selector>      <end>|<skipStart>|<requiredStart>  ; Combine all of the selection restrictions 
    =>          \\(v|m?s)|\\f\s|\\\+?ndEternel     ; which simplifies to 
    =>          \\(v|m?s|f\s|\+?nd)|Eternel

Complete regex:
regex:(?<=\\v\s\S+\s)(((?!\\(v|m?s|f\s|\+?nd)|Eternel).)*(((\\f\s((?!\\f\*).)*\\f\*)((?!\\(v|m?s|f\s|\+?nd)|Eternel).)*)*(\\\+?nd[^\\]*?\\\+?nd\*|Eternel))){1,1}((?!\\(v|m?s|f\s|\+?nd)|Eternel).)*((\\f\s([^\\]|\\(?!f\*))*\\f\*)((?!\\(v|m?s|f\s|\+?nd)|Eternel).)*)*(?=(\\(v|m?s))|\Z)