Regular Expressions 101

Pro

^start of line

:the literal : (58₁₀ / 72₈ / 3A₁₆)

Group 1([\w:|!.?%()-]+)

Character Class[\w:|!.?%()-]+

+matches at least one character from the set below:

\wa Unicode word character

:the literal : (58₁₀ / 72₈ / 3A₁₆)

|the literal | (124₁₀ / 174₈ / 7C₁₆)

!the literal ! (33₁₀ / 41₈ / 21₁₆)

.the literal . (46₁₀ / 56₈ / 2E₁₆)

?the literal ? (63₁₀ / 77₈ / 3F₁₆)

%the literal % (37₁₀ / 45₈ / 25₁₆)

(the literal ( (40₁₀ / 50₈ / 28₁₆)

)the literal ) (41₁₀ / 51₈ / 29₁₆)

-the literal - (45₁₀ / 55₈ / 2D₁₆)

\ta tab character (ASCII 9)

Group 2(.*(?:\n(?!:[\w:|!.?%()-]+\t).*)*)

.*any Unicode character (except for line terminators), repeated any number of times

Non-Capturing Group(?:\n(?!:[\w:|!.?%()-]+\t).*)*

*repeats the group contents below any number of times:

\na line-feed (newline) character (ASCII 10)

Negative Lookahead(?!:[\w:|!.?%()-]+\t)

:the literal : (58₁₀ / 72₈ / 3A₁₆)

Character Class[\w:|!.?%()-]+

+matches at least one character from the set below:

\wa Unicode word character

:the literal : (58₁₀ / 72₈ / 3A₁₆)

|the literal | (124₁₀ / 174₈ / 7C₁₆)

!the literal ! (33₁₀ / 41₈ / 21₁₆)

.the literal . (46₁₀ / 56₈ / 2E₁₆)

?the literal ? (63₁₀ / 77₈ / 3F₁₆)

%the literal % (37₁₀ / 45₈ / 25₁₆)

(the literal ( (40₁₀ / 50₈ / 28₁₆)

)the literal ) (41₁₀ / 51₈ / 29₁₆)

-the literal - (45₁₀ / 55₈ / 2D₁₆)

\ta tab character (ASCII 9)

.*any Unicode character (except for line terminators), repeated any number of times

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

Regular Expression

^:([\w:|!.?%()-]+)\t(.*(?:\n(?!:[\w:|!.?%()-]+\t).*)*)

New

#% text_encoding = utf8

:xy_name1	Text

:xy_name2	Text text text to a text. 

Text and text to text text, text and 

text provides text text text text.

:xy_name3	Text

Substitution

#% text_encoding = utf8

:xy_name1	Text

:xy_name2	Text text text to a text. 

Text and text to text text, text and 

text provides text text text text.

:xy_name3	Text