On 2010-12-15, Dave Ratcliffe wrote:
I note at the end of the "Searching with Grep" section of the online
help manual that O'Reilly & Associates' "Mastering Regular
Expressions," is recommended. Is there anything that any of you think
is superior to this as a comprehensive reference for grep and regular
expressions?
That's the best. Worth investing in the latest edition (third,
2006), but a used first (1997) or second edition can teach most
of it.
In my own experience and observation of others, you can probably
expect to work your way up through levels of regex power. A
worthy height to reach is facility with look-ahead and
look-behind assertions, both positive and negative (see Ronald's suggestion).
Other resources:
O'Reilly also has a pocket reference, and I see they now have a
Reg Ex Cookbook but I haven't read it.
As additional learning tools, check out a swell pair of features
in BBEdit's search dialog:
- it caches recent search expressions (see the clock icon); and
- you can save and name your regexen for convenient future use
(the 'g' icon).
These features allow you to rapidly try variations without
losing previous tries. I save regexen to use for tasks I expect
again and sometimes just to enjoy the satisfaction of composing
one that powerfully handled a problem.
BBedit also gives you the ability to properly escape characters
as needed for use in regular expression searches, with the menu
command Search -> Use Selection for Grep Search. This can be a
guide in learning when to escape which characters when creating
regular expressions by hand.
Finally, this BBEdit list has some master regex adepts, among
them some who responded to your post, and is a friendly place
for learning (provided that you try it first on your own :-).
HTH
- Bruce
_bruce__van_allen__santa_cruz_ca_
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