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
Processing...

Test String

Code Generator

Language

Generated Code

use strict; my $str = '{{Wikibooks|Wikijunior:Countries A-Z|France}} {{Sister project links|France}} * [http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-17298730 France] from the [[BBC News]] * [http://ucblibraries.colorado.edu/govpubs/for/france.htm France] at \'\'UCB Libraries GovPubs\'\' *{{dmoz|Regional/Europe/France}} * [http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/215768/France France] \'\'Encyclopædia Britannica\'\' entry * [http://europa.eu/about-eu/countries/member-countries/france/index_en.htm France] at the [[European Union|EU]] *{{Wikiatlas|France}} *{{osmrelation-inline|1403916}} * [http://www.ifs.du.edu/ifs/frm_CountryProfile.aspx?Country=FR Key Development Forecasts for France] from [[International Futures]] ;Economy *{{INSEE|National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies}} * [http://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?QueryId=14594 OECD France statistics]'; my $regex = qr/\[ (?# match [ literally) ( (?# start capture group) http (?# match http literally) \S+ (?# match 1+ non-whitespace characters) ) (?# end capture group) \s+ (?# match 1+ whitespace characters) ( (?# start capture group) [^\]]+ (?# match 1+ non-] characters) ) (?# end capture group) \] (?# match ] literally) (?: (?# start non-capturing group) \s+ (?# match 1+ whitespace characters) from (?# match from literally) (?: (?# start non-capturing group) \s+ (?# match 1+ whitespace characters) the (?# match the literally) )? (?# end optional non-capturing group) \s+ (?# match 1+ whitespace characters) \[\[ (?# match [[ literally) ( (?# start capturing group) .*? (?# lazily match 0+ characters) ) (?# end capturing group) \]\] (?# match ]] literally) )? (?# end optional non-caputring group)/xp; if ( $str =~ /$regex/g ) { print "Whole match is ${^MATCH} and its start/end positions can be obtained via \$-[0] and \$+[0]\n"; # print "Capture Group 1 is $1 and its start/end positions can be obtained via \$-[1] and \$+[1]\n"; # print "Capture Group 2 is $2 ... and so on\n"; } # ${^POSTMATCH} and ${^PREMATCH} are also available with the use of '/p' # Named capture groups can be called via $+{name}

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 Perl, please visit: http://perldoc.perl.org/perlre.html