Regular Expressions 101

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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

/
/
xgm

Test String

Code Generator

Generated Code

import java.util.regex.Matcher; import java.util.regex.Pattern; public class Example { public static void main(String[] args) { final String regex = "^((?! # This and the final line allow invert the regex condition\n\n" + "PA(?:\n" + " \\*(?:N\\s*\\d+\\s*\\.\\s*\\d+\\s*\\*ADP)? # match the asterisk cases\n" + " | \\#\\s*N\\s*\\d+\\s* # or the hash cases\n" + " (?:[\\.,-]\\s*\\d+\\s*){0,5}\n" + " \\#ADP\\s*(?:\\d|\\#PUSH)\n" + " | \\#NUAL,AZ,AN\\#FOP\\d # or the 'UAL,AZ,AN' literal\n" + ")\n\n" + ").)*$"; final String string = "# OP's samples\n" + "PA#N1.1#ADP1\n" + "PA#N1.1,1.2#ADP1,2\n" + "PA#N1#ADP4\n" + "PA#N1,2#ADP4\n" + "PA#N1,2.1,3#ADP1\n" + "PA#N1.1-3#ADP1\n" + "PA#N1.1- 3.2#ADP1,2\n" + "PA#NUAL,AZ,AN#FOP123\n" + "PA#N1.1-2.1,3.1#ADP#PUSH\n" + "PA*N1.1*ADP\n" + "PA*\n\n" + "# The same with some spaces adde here and there\n" + "PA# N 1.1 #ADP1\n" + "PA#N 1.1,1.2#ADP1,2 \n" + "PA#N1#ADP4 \n" + "PA#N1,2 #ADP4 \n" + "PA#N1,2. 1,3#ADP1 \n" + "PA#N1.1-3#ADP1\n" + "PA#N1.1- 3.2#ADP1,2 \n" + "PA#NUAL,AZ,AN#FOP123 \n" + "PA#N1.1-2 . 1 , 3 . 1 #ADP#PUSH \n" + "PA*N1 .1*ADP \n\n" + "PA#N1.1...#5#SOME TEXT\n"; final Pattern pattern = Pattern.compile(regex, Pattern.COMMENTS | Pattern.MULTILINE); final Matcher matcher = pattern.matcher(string); while (matcher.find()) { System.out.println("Full match: " + matcher.group(0)); for (int i = 1; i <= matcher.groupCount(); i++) { System.out.println("Group " + i + ": " + matcher.group(i)); } } } }

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 Java, please visit: https://docs.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/api/java/util/regex/Pattern.html