Regexpes exist to avoid cumbersome code like this, to make it less error prone. Makes me sad to see so many upvotes.

I get that some people have a hard time understanding regexpes with all the backtracking and greediness. Yes, syntax is a bit complicated. Maybe simplified predictable default mode could help. But there is no problem with DSL being used as an abstraction. In fact, we need more DSLs, for everything!