IDE regular expressions
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Normal regular expression
Metacharacters:
\ Quote the next metacharacter ^ Match the beginning of the line . Match any character (except newline). Example: 'a.c' matches 'abc', 'aBC', 'axc', 'a3c', 'a$c', etc. $ Match the end of the line (or before newline at the end) | Alternation () Grouping. For example: (abc)+ matches 'abc' or 'abcabc' or 'abcabcabc' etc. [] Character class
Quantifiers:
* Match 0 or more times + Match 1 or more times ? Match 1 or 0 times {n} Match exactly n times {n,} Match at least n times {n,m} Match at least n but not more than m times
Curly brackets in any other context is treated as a regular character. The ``* is equivalent to {0,}, the ``+ to {1,} and the ``? to {0,1}.
By default, a quantifier is greedy, that means, it will match as many times as possible. To match the minimum number of times possible, append a ``?.
*? Match 0 or more times +? Match 1 or more times ?? Match 0 or 1 time {n}? Match exactly n times {n,}? Match at least n times {n,m}? Match at least n but not more than m times
Simple Syntax
Some IDE dialogs provide a checkbox to enable 'simple syntax'. These regular expressions are shorter for common file name filters.
Technically it does this:
The following characters are replaced with . -> \. * -> .* ? -> . , -> | ; -> | Finally enclose by ^( )$
Quoted symbols
The backslash '\' can be used to treat special characters like '.' as normal character or to get some special ranges.
\. matches a point '.' \d matches a number character '0'..'9' \D matches a non number character \s matches a space character ' ',#9,#10,#12,#13 \S matches a non space character \w matches a word character 'a'..'z','A'..'Z','0'..'9','_' \W matches a non word character
Search and Replace with regular expressions
The find dialogs support regular expressions for finding and replacing. Each found pattern grouped in round brackets can be used by a $1, ..., $9 variable
For example:
- Find expression: a(.*)c
- Replace expression: A$1C
- Text: 'abc aLazc'
The $1 will be replaced with the found text, that matches the first bracket.
- Result: 'AbC ALazC'