Regular Expressions 101

Pro

1st Alternative^[a-z'-]+

^start of line

Character Class[a-z'-]+

+matches at least one character from the set below:

a-zone character from a (97₁₀) to z (122₁₀) (case sensitive)

'the literal ' (39₁₀ / 47₈ / 27₁₆)

-the literal - (45₁₀ / 55₈ / 2D₁₆)

2nd Alternative\b(?|my|is|to|the)\b(*SKIP)(*FAIL)

\ban ASCII word boundary

Branch Reset Group(?|my|is|to|the)

1st Alternativemy

mythe literal text my (case sensitive)

2nd Alternativeis

isthe literal text is (case sensitive)

3rd Alternativeto

tothe literal text to (case sensitive)

4th Alternativethe

thethe literal text the (case sensitive)

\ban ASCII word boundary

(*SKIP)acts like (*PRUNE), but the next unanchored match attempt starts where (*SKIP) was reached instead of at the next subject character

(*FAIL)forces the current match attempt to fail at this position

3rd Alternative[a-z'-]+

Character Class[a-z'-]+

+matches at least one character from the set below:

a-zone character from a (97₁₀) to z (122₁₀) (case sensitive)

'the literal ' (39₁₀ / 47₈ / 27₁₆)

-the literal - (45₁₀ / 55₈ / 2D₁₆)

Global pattern flags

g modifier: global. Finds all matches instead of stopping after the first

m modifier: multiline. Causes ^ and $ to match the start and end of each line, not only the start and end of the string

Detailed match information will be displayed here automatically.

25 tokens

^[a-z'-]+|\b(?|my|is|to|the)\b(*SKIP)(*FAIL)|[a-z'-]+

New

my cat is going to the vet in wilkes-barre.

my cat isn't going to the vet today.

doesn't your cat need to get a needle soon?

my cat is going to the vet in wilkes-barre.

my cat isn't going to the vet today.

doesn't your cat need to get a needle soon?