Help with regular expression

hi, i am huge newb when it comes to this regular expression stuff. i have
been researching like crazy but it sure isn't an easy thing to learn. what i
am trying to accomplish is to download only the hdtv versions of certain shows
through azureus's rssfeed scanner. i have managed to make a regular
expression that works for all but one item. the expression i have been using
is very simple and looks like this, supernatural.+(hdtv). but when i try and
do the same to download only the 720p version of 24 it does not work. every
variation i tried failed a test until i tried [(24.)+(720p)]. i know that is
probably completely wrong and not even a valid expression but it seemed to
work. until after the first night i realized anything that matched all the
characters in the expression downloaded. so as long as there was a 2, 4, 7, 0
and a p in the title it downloaded. can anyone help me make an expression
that will only download episodes of 24 that are 720p?

any help will be greatly appreciated.

well, the filter for 24 mentioned by one of the admins is the following:

^24\s

i think if you try adding ".+720" to that it might work?
dunno for sure, i got my filters to work by trial.+error ;-) and some help of the admins here.

good luck.

thanks, i will try that. i also have gotten most of my filters to work by
trial and error but this one was just stubborn.

making an exclusions filter would help with downloading the hdtv feeds but i
don't see how it will automatically grab the 720p version. by making an
exclusion for pdtv i can be sure i am grabbing only hdtv versions but there is
nothing i know of that indicates an hdtv feed is not 720p. so yes i may be
doing it the hard way for the hdtv expressions but then again i tend to like
to do things tha hard way cause there is no better way to learn.

at this point though i am so frustrated with 24 that i am willing to try the
easy way if someone knows of a exclusion i can create that will ensure 720p.

thanks for all the help guys.

is a positive filter possible? i could make a pass filter with 720p and put
it above all the shows i want to download in 720p. i tried setting this up
but getting inconsistent results when i test it.

as mentioned previously, ^24\\s.+720p will do the job.

you are going to run into problems trying to do exclusions to only get
higher res versions since they tend to have the hdtv string in common
with the lower res items.

as far as a global pass filter ... hrmmm - there may be a way to "double
negative" the rule ... i.e. `fail everything that's not blah`

let me go and test 😉

ok - my head officially hurts now.

the regex engine in rss feed scanner is doing something deeply suspect when it
comes to negative matching.
i.e. trying to use a fail rule for a fairly simple expression that just says :-

`match any line that does not include hdtv`

try as i might, with whatever regex syntax flavour i tried, i could not get it
to behave. it was being completely erratic and unpredictable with what it
would and wouldn't catch, even on subsequent refreshes of unchanged feeds.

looks like the best bet is to stick with `positive` matching methods in the
fail rules.

heh.... that made me proud 😉