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
No Match

/
/
gm

Test String

Code Generator

Language

Generated Code

use strict; my $str = 'Frederick Clarke Birth 6 Feb 1871 Death 7 Nov 1952 (aged 81) Sheffield Burial Crookes Cemetery Sheffield, Metropolitan Borough of Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England Show MapGPS-Latitude: 53.384024, Longitude: -1.515043 Plot MM 7848 Memorial ID 237065233'; my $regex = qr/^(?<forename>.+?)\s(?<surname>\w+)\nBirth\n(?:(?<birth_day>(\d{1,2}|unknown))\s(?<birth_month>\w{3})\s(?<birth_year>\d{4})|\bunknown\b)\n(?<birth_location>.+?\n)?Death\n(?:(?<death_day>(\d{1,2}|unknown))\s(?<death_month>\w{3})\s(?<death_year>\d{4})(?:\s*\(aged\s*(?<age>\d+)\))?|unknown)\n(?<death_location>.+?)\nBurial\n(?<cemetery_name>.+?)\n(?<cemetery_location>.+?)\n(?:Show MapGPS-Latitude:\s*(?<latitude>-?\d+\.\d+),\s*Longitude:\s*(?<longitude>-?\d+\.\d+))?\n?(?:Plot\n(?<plot>.+?)\n?)?Memorial ID\n(?<memorial_id>\d+)/mp; 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