New to Regex, Can't figure out conditional ?()| method

Question

Ok, I've used some regular expressions in the past but I've never gotten deep into them. I thought I would expand my knowledge but I'm hitting three different walls. First How do I use the Conditional Operator ?() and ?()|

I needed to use it on a time format in a flat text file

ie.

10:38 A

I extracted the time and tried to flip the A to an AM or P to an PM with

?(A)AM|PM

what got me is that it did still find the A and P but didn't put them out as AM or PM.

Second one

I'm trying to break down the parts of the following lines

(1)   CL STAR ZONE                      59      (6)

(?<Position>\(\d*\))\s*(?<Name>\s+[A-Z\s]+)\s*(?<Weight>([0-9]{1,2}))\s*(?<Unknown1>\(\d*\))

or

(3)   LEONARD SLYE                      81      (5/2)

(?<Position>\(\d*\))\s*(?<Name>\s+[A-Z\s]+)\s*(?<Weight>([0-9]{1,2}))\s*(?<Unknown1>\(\d*/\d*\))

I can do either but not both. I've got over 20 years in i.t. and 17 plus in microsoft c languages but I just haven't really dealt with this area much.

I can't remember the third one

Thanks,

Bubba

Answer 1

1st one can't be done with a regex. Conditional expressions work *inside* the matching process, but do nothing with the replacement or changing process. You can use \d{1,2}:\d{2} (A|P)

And then in the Replace Method use a MatchEvaluator and do the actual swapping in code, not with a regex

2nd one. 

change the last bit to read: \(\d*(/\d*)?\))

To make the division an optional part.

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