Regex capture group with non-uniform space group-CodePudding

I'm trying to parse the output of the "display interface brief" Comware switch command to convert it to a CSV file using RegEx. This command is printed using the following format:

Interface            Link Speed   Duplex Type PVID Description 
BAGG51               UP   4G(a)   F(a)   T    1                      
FGE1/0/42            DOWN auto    A      T    1              ###   LIVRE   ###
GE6/0/20             UP   100M(a) F(a)   A    1        LIVRE (MGMT - [WAN8-P8]

It's seems quite challenging for me because doesn't matter which RegEx I try, it doesn't properly handle "DOWN auto" and "100M(a) F(a)" output that has only one space between them. I also couldn't find a way to properly handle the last field, that can contain one or more spaces, but into most RegEx that I tried it create a separate capture group for each space instead of handling it's text content properly.

I'd also tried countless ways to try to parse it, and I couldn't find much content about parsing non-uniform columns into the Internet and StackOverflow community.

I need to parse it into the following format, with 7 capture groups per line, respecting the end of line:

BAGG51;UP;4G(a);F(a);T;1
FGE1/0/42;DOWN;auto;A;T;1;###   LIVRE   ###
GE6/0/20;UP;100M(a);F(a);A;1;LIVRE (MGMT - [WAN8-P8]

The most successfully RegEx that I found so far was: ^(\S )\s (\S )\s (\S )\s (\S )\s (\S )\s (\S )\s (\S ) replacing it to $1;$2;$3;$4;$5;$6;$7 using Notepad but it doesn't properly handle the "Description" field, that can be empty.

CodePudding user response：

The following pattern seems to be working here:

^(\S )\s (\S )\s (\S )\s (\S )\s (\S )\s (\S )(?:[ ] (.*))?

This follows your pattern with six mandatory capture groups, followed by an optional seventh capture group. The (?:[ ] (\S ))? at the end of the pattern matches one or more spaces followed by the content. Note that this pattern should be used in multiline mode.

Here is a working demo