Regular Expressions 101

Save & Share

Flavor

  • PCRE2 (PHP >=7.3)
  • PCRE (PHP <7.3)
  • ECMAScript (JavaScript)
  • Python
  • Golang
  • Java 8
  • .NET 7.0 (C#)
  • Rust
  • Regex Flavor Guide

Function

  • Match
  • Substitution
  • List
  • Unit Tests

Tools

Sponsors
There are currently no sponsors. Become a sponsor today!
An explanation of your regex will be automatically generated as you type.
Detailed match information will be displayed here automatically.
  • All Tokens
  • Common Tokens
  • General Tokens
  • Anchors
  • Meta Sequences
  • Quantifiers
  • Group Constructs
  • Character Classes
  • Flags/Modifiers
  • Substitution
  • A single character of: a, b or c
    [abc]
  • A character except: a, b or c
    [^abc]
  • A character in the range: a-z
    [a-z]
  • A character not in the range: a-z
    [^a-z]
  • A character in the range: a-z or A-Z
    [a-zA-Z]
  • Any single character
    .
  • Alternate - match either a or b
    a|b
  • Any whitespace character
    \s
  • Any non-whitespace character
    \S
  • Any digit
    \d
  • Any non-digit
    \D
  • Any word character
    \w
  • Any non-word character
    \W
  • Non-capturing group
    (?:...)
  • Capturing group
    (...)
  • Zero or one of a
    a?
  • Zero or more of a
    a*
  • One or more of a
    a+
  • Exactly 3 of a
    a{3}
  • 3 or more of a
    a{3,}
  • Between 3 and 6 of a
    a{3,6}
  • Start of string
    ^
  • End of string
    $
  • A word boundary
    \b
  • Non-word boundary
    \B

Regular Expression

/
/
gm

Test String

Code Generator

Generated Code

# coding=utf8 # the above tag defines encoding for this document and is for Python 2.x compatibility import re regex = r"IN=(?P<source_interface>(\S+|\s?)) OUT=(?P<forward_interface>(\S+|\s?)) MAC=(?P<source_mac>(\S+|\s?)) SRC=(?P<source_ip>(?:([0-9]{1,3}\.){3}[0-9]{1,3})) DST=(?P<destination_ip>(?:([0-9]{1,3}\.){3}[0-9]{1,3})) LEN=(?P<pkt_len>\d+) TOS=(?P<pkt_tos>[\dx\d]+) PREC=(?P<pkt_prec>[\dx\d]+) TTL=(?P<pkt_ttl>\d+) ID=(?P<pkt_id>\d+)\s?(?P<pk_frg>[A-Z\s].?)\s?PROTO=(?P<pkt_protocol>[\w\d]+) SPT=(?P<source_port>\d+) DPT=(?P<dest_port>\d+) (LEN=(?P<pkt_length>\d+))?(WINDOW=(?P<pkt_window>\d+) RES=(?P<pkt_res>[\dx\d]+)? (?P<pkt_type>(\S+))?\s?(URGP=(?P<pkt_urgency>\d))?)?" test_str = ("IN=pppoe0 OUT= MAC= SRC=45.134.26.235 DST=51.148.135.105 LEN=40 TOS=0x00 PREC=0x00 TTL=244 ID=21599 PROTO=TCP SPT=41497 DPT=33241 WINDOW=1024 RES=0x00 SYN URGP=0\n" "IN=eth1 OUT=eth1.20 MAC=fc:ec:da:47:47:e6:b4:2e:99:19:8e:79:08:00 SRC=10.231.1.21 DST=10.231.20.5 LEN=60 TOS=0x00 PREC=0x00 TTL=63 ID=22819 DF PROTO=TCP SPT=58474 DPT=8123 WINDOW=64240 RES=0x00 SYN URGP=0\n" "IN=eth1.40 OUT=eth1 MAC=fc:ec:da:47:47:e6:ea:5e:e5:92:bd:3d:08:00:45:00:00:46 SRC=10.231.40.108 DST=10.231.1.22 LEN=70 TOS=0x00 PREC=0x00 TTL=63 ID=58349 DF PROTO=UDP SPT=58673 DPT=53 LEN=50\n" "IN=pppoe0 OUT= MAC= SRC=37.120.166.236 DST=51.148.135.105 LEN=60 TOS=0x00 PREC=0x00 TTL=52 ID=27591 DF PROTO=TCP SPT=35990 DPT=18080 WINDOW=29200 RES=0x00 SYN URGP=0") matches = re.finditer(regex, test_str, re.MULTILINE) for matchNum, match in enumerate(matches, start=1): print ("Match {matchNum} was found at {start}-{end}: {match}".format(matchNum = matchNum, start = match.start(), end = match.end(), match = match.group())) for groupNum in range(0, len(match.groups())): groupNum = groupNum + 1 print ("Group {groupNum} found at {start}-{end}: {group}".format(groupNum = groupNum, start = match.start(groupNum), end = match.end(groupNum), group = match.group(groupNum))) # Note: for Python 2.7 compatibility, use ur"" to prefix the regex and u"" to prefix the test string and substitution.

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 Python, please visit: https://docs.python.org/3/library/re.html