This is super simplified, but it’s enough to get started with. I remember being confused by the gigantic tables with all the special clauses, so when you’re beginning keep it simple.
Remember if you want to match a literal character you can just type it out, unless there’s a special character. Special characters have meanings in regex patterns, so you need to type a \ in front of them if you want to specifically match them in the pattern.
Common special characters are: + . \ – [] {} $ ? |
Example: If I wanted to match taste, taster, tasters, I would type a pattern like taste\w{0,2}
If I wanted to match taste!, I would write a pattern like taste\!
Code | What does it Match? |
\d | Numbers |
\w | Word characters like letters of any case |
\s | Spaces |
\b | Boundary of a word character |
\D | Not a number |
\W | Not a word character |
\S | Not a space |
\n | Line break |
\r | Line break |
\t | Tab |
? | Previous code is optional |
* | Repeat previous code 0 to infinity |
+ | Repeat previous code once or more |
{1} | Repeat previous code once (can use any number) |
{1,2} | Repeat previous code 1 to 2 times (can use any numbers) |