From: Chris Erdal <chris@...>
Date: 2006-07-14T00:45:05+09:00
Subject: Re: Help with a regexp

> I've been experimenting with Ruby ... Tuesday, ... 

I never even noticed! talk about showing your age :-) 

sorry, I caught the colon at the start of each word - should have been :

s = "3:a:23:cat5:sheep"
words = []
until s.empty?
  begin
    unless digits = s.slice!(/\d+(?=:)/)
      raise "I can't find an integer followed by a colon"
    end
    s.slice!(0)
    words << s.slice!(0..digits.to_i-1)
    unless words.last.size >= digits.to_i
      raise "I ran out of characters; looking for #{digits} characters,
#{s.size} left"
    end
  rescue RuntimeError => e
    warn "Looking at #{s.inspect},"
    warn e.message
    abort "Words found so far: #{words.inspect}"
  end
end
puts "Words found: ", words

Goodbye,
-- 
chris