This might suffice. It relies on the continuation lines starting (after the leading whitespace) with at least 3 non-space, non-':' characters.
#! perl -slw
use strict;
my $def =<<'EOD';
bean
n 1: any of various edible seeds of plants of the family
Leguminosae [syn: {edible bean}]
2: any of various seeds or fruits suggestive of beans
3: any of various leguminous plants grown for their edible
seeds and pods [syn: {bean plant}]
4: informal terms for a human head [syn: {attic}, {bonce}, {noodl
+e},
{noggin}, {dome}]
v : hit on the head, esp. with a pitched baseball
EOD
$def =~ s[\n\s+(?=[^\s:]{3})][ ]smg or warn 'no match';
print $def;
__END__
c:\test>junk
bean
n 1: any of various edible seeds of plants of the family Legumino
+sae [syn: {edible bean}]
2: any of various seeds or fruits suggestive of beans
3: any of various leguminous plants grown for their edible seeds
+and pods [syn: {bean plant}]
4: informal terms for a human head [syn: {attic}, {bonce}, {noodl
+e}, {noggin}, {dome}]
v : hit on the head, esp. with a pitched baseball
Examine what is said, not who speaks -- Silence betokens consent -- Love the truth but pardon error.
"Science is about questioning the status quo. Questioning authority".
In the absence of evidence, opinion is indistinguishable from prejudice.
-
Are you posting in the right place? Check out Where do I post X? to know for sure.
-
Posts may use any of the Perl Monks Approved HTML tags. Currently these include the following:
<code> <a> <b> <big>
<blockquote> <br /> <dd>
<dl> <dt> <em> <font>
<h1> <h2> <h3> <h4>
<h5> <h6> <hr /> <i>
<li> <nbsp> <ol> <p>
<small> <strike> <strong>
<sub> <sup> <table>
<td> <th> <tr> <tt>
<u> <ul>
-
Snippets of code should be wrapped in
<code> tags not
<pre> tags. In fact, <pre>
tags should generally be avoided. If they must
be used, extreme care should be
taken to ensure that their contents do not
have long lines (<70 chars), in order to prevent
horizontal scrolling (and possible janitor
intervention).
-
Want more info? How to link
or How to display code and escape characters
are good places to start.
|