re = /^(.*) is eating a ((?:(?!\b(?:by|at)\b).)*?)(?: ?\bby ((?:(?!\bat\b).)*?))?(?: ?\bat (.*))?$/m
str = 'Rafael C. is eating a Burger by McDonalds at Beach
David K. is eating a Burger by McDonalds
John G. is eating a by at House'
# Print the match result
str.scan(re) do |match|
puts match.to_s
end
Please keep in mind that these code samples are automatically generated and are not guaranteed to work. If you find any syntax errors, feel free to submit a bug report. For a full regex reference for Ruby, please visit: http://ruby-doc.org/core-2.2.0/Regexp.html