Short version:
I am having a rather hard time understanding two rather complex regular expressions in the ActiveSupport::Inflector::camelize method.
This is the definition of the camelize method:
def camelize(term, uppercase_first_letter = true)
string = term.to_s
if uppercase_first_letter
string = string.sub(/^[a-z\d]*/) { inflections.acronyms[$&] || $&.capitalize }
else
string = string.sub(/^(?:#{inflections.acronym_regex}(?=\b|[A-Z_])|\w)/) { $&.downcase }
end
string.gsub(/(?:_|(\/))([a-z\d]*)/i) { "#{$1}#{inflections.acronyms[$2] || $2.capitalize}" }.gsub('/', '::')
end
I have some difficulty understanding:
string = string.sub(/^(?:#{inflections.acronym_regex}(?=\b|[A-Z_])|\w)/) { $&.downcase }
and:
string.gsub(/(?:_|(\/))([a-z\d]*)/i) { "#{$1}#{inflections.acronyms[$2] || $2.capitalize}" }.gsub('/', '::')
Please explain to me what they mean. Thank you.
Long version
This shows me trying to understand the regex and how I interpret them to mean. It would be very helpful if you could go through this and correct my mistakes.
For the first regex
string = string.sub(/^(?:#{inflections.acronym_regex}(?=\b|[A-Z_])|\w)/) { $&.downcase }
Based on what I am seeing, inflections.acronym_regex is from the Inflections class in the ActiveSupport::Inflector module, and in the initialize method of the Inflections class,
def initialize
#plurals, #singulars, #uncountables, #humans, #acronyms, #acronym_regex = [], [], [], [], {}, /(?=a)b/
end
acronym_regex is assigned /(?=a)b/. From what I understand from http://www.ruby-doc.org/core-2.0.0/Regexp.html#class-Regexp-label-Anchors ,
(?=pat) - Positive lookahead assertion: ensures that the following characters match pat, but doesn't include those characters in the matched text
So /(?=a)b/ ensures that character a is inside the text, but we dont include character a inside the matched text, and what immediately follows character a must be character b. In other words, "abc" would match this regex, but "bbc" would not match this regex, and the matched text for "abc" would be "b" (instead of "ab").
So combining the value of inflections.acronym_regex into this regex /^(?:#{inflections.acronym_regex}(?=\b|[A-Z_])|\w)/, I do not know which of the following two regex results:
A. /^(?:/(?=a)b/(?=\b|[A-Z_])|\w)/
B. /^(?:(?=a)b(?=\b|[A-Z_])|\w)/
although I am thinking it is B. From what I understand, (?: provides grouping without capturing, (?= means positive lookahead assertion, \b matches word boundaries when outside brackets and matches backspace when inside brackets. So in english terms, regex B, when matching against a text, will find a string that begins with an a character, followed by a b character, and one of (1. backspace [whatever that may mean] 2. any uppercase character or underscore 3. any english alphabetic character, digit, or underscore).
However, I find it strange that passing upper_case_first_letter = false to the camelize function should cause it to match a string starting with the characters ab, given that that does not seem to be how the camelize function behaves.
For the second regex
string.gsub(/(?:_|(\/))([a-z\d]*)/i) { "#{$1}#{inflections.acronyms[$2] || $2.capitalize}" }.gsub('/', '::')
The regex is:
/(?:_|(\/))([a-z\d]*)/i
I am guessing that this regex will match a substring that starts with either an _ or /, followed by 0 or more (upper or lowercase english alpabetic characters or digit). Furthermore, for the first group (?:_|(\/)), whether we match the _ or /, the ([a-z\d]*) capturing group will always be regarded as the second group. I do understand the part where the block tries to look up inflections.acronyms[$2] and on failure, does $2.captitalize.
Since (?: means grouping without capturing, what is the value of $1 when we match _ ? Is it still _ ? And for the .gsub('/', '::') portion, I am guessing that it gets applied for each match in the initial gsub, instead of being applied to the overall string after the outer gsub call is done?
Apologies for the really long post. Please point out my errors in understanding the 2 regular expressions, or explain them in a better way if you can do it.
Thank you.
However, I find it strange that passing upper_case_first_letter =
false to the camelize function should cause it to match a string
starting with the characters ab, given that that does not seem to be
how the camelize function behaves.
?: acts like a . here and does match the string (ie. single character) but there is no grouping, therefore the match is in $&.
Since (?: means grouping without capturing, what is the value of $1
when we match _ ? Is it still _ ?
It's nil since there is no capturing. The value is in $2
And for the .gsub('/', '::') portion, I am guessing that it gets
applied for each match in the initial gsub, instead of being applied
to the overall string after the outer gsub call is done?
It's applied to the overall result as gsub with block returns a string and the gsub('/', '::') is outside of a block.
Related
I have a name spaced class..
"CommonCar::RedTrunk"
I need to convert it to an underscored string "common_car_red_trunk", but when I use
"CommonCar::RedTrunk".underscore, I get "common_car/red_trunk" instead.
Is there another method to accomplish what I need?
Solutions:
"CommonCar::RedTrunk".gsub(':', '').underscore
or:
"CommonCar::RedTrunk".sub('::', '').underscore
or:
"CommonCar::RedTrunk".tr(':', '').underscore
Alternate:
Or turn any of these around and do the underscore() first, followed by whatever method you want to use to replace "/" with "_".
Explanation:
While all of these methods look basically the same, there are subtle differences that can be very impactful.
In short:
gsub() – uses a regex to do pattern matching, therefore, it's finding any occurrence of ":" and replacing it with "".
sub() – uses a regex to do pattern matching, similarly to gsub(), with the exception that it's only finding the first occurrence (the "g" in gsub() meaning "global"). This is why when using that method, it was necessary to use "::", otherwise a single ":" would have been left. Keep in mind with this method, it will only work with a single-nested namespace. Meaning "CommonCar::RedTrunk::BigWheels" would have been transformed to "CommonCarRedTrunk::BigWheels".
tr() – uses the string parameters as arrays of single character replacments. In this case, because we're only replacing a single character, it'll work identically to gsub(). However, if you wanted to replace "on" with "EX", for example, gsub("on", "EX") would produce "CommEXCar::RedTrunk" while tr("on", "EX") would produce "CEmmEXCar::RedTruXk".
Docs:
https://apidock.com/ruby/String/gsub
https://apidock.com/ruby/String/sub
https://apidock.com/ruby/String/tr
This is a pure-Ruby solution.
r = /(?<=[a-z])(?=[A-Z])|::/
"CommonCar::RedTrunk".gsub(r, '_').downcase
#=> "common_car_red_trunk"
See (the first form of) String#gsub and String#downcase.
The regular expression can be made self-documenting by writing it in free-spacing mode:
r = /
(?<=[a-z]) # assert that the previous character is lower-case
(?=[A-Z]) # assert that the following character is upper-case
| # or
:: # match '::'
/x # free-spacing regex definition mode
(?<=[a-z]) is a positive lookbehind; (?=[A-Z]) is a positive lookahead.
Note that /(?<=[a-z])(?=[A-Z])/ matches an empty ("zero-width") string. r matches, for example, the empty string between 'Common' and 'Car', because it is preceeded by a lower-case letter and followed by an upper-case letter.
I don't know Rails but I'm guessing you could write
"CommonCar::RedTrunk".delete(':').underscore
I need a regular expression able to match everything but a string starting with a specific pattern (specifically index.php and what follows, like index.php?id=2342343).
Regex: match everything but:
a string starting with a specific pattern (e.g. any - empty, too - string not starting with foo):
Lookahead-based solution for NFAs:
^(?!foo).*$
^(?!foo)
Negated character class based solution for regex engines not supporting lookarounds:
^(([^f].{2}|.[^o].|.{2}[^o]).*|.{0,2})$
^([^f].{2}|.[^o].|.{2}[^o])|^.{0,2}$
a string ending with a specific pattern (say, no world. at the end):
Lookbehind-based solution:
(?<!world\.)$
^.*(?<!world\.)$
Lookahead solution:
^(?!.*world\.$).*
^(?!.*world\.$)
POSIX workaround:
^(.*([^w].{5}|.[^o].{4}|.{2}[^r].{3}|.{3}[^l].{2}|.{4}[^d].|.{5}[^.])|.{0,5})$
([^w].{5}|.[^o].{4}|.{2}[^r].{3}|.{3}[^l].{2}|.{4}[^d].|.{5}[^.]$|^.{0,5})$
a string containing specific text (say, not match a string having foo):
Lookaround-based solution:
^(?!.*foo)
^(?!.*foo).*$
POSIX workaround:
Use the online regex generator at www.formauri.es/personal/pgimeno/misc/non-match-regex
a string containing specific character (say, avoid matching a string having a | symbol):
^[^|]*$
a string equal to some string (say, not equal to foo):
Lookaround-based:
^(?!foo$)
^(?!foo$).*$
POSIX:
^(.{0,2}|.{4,}|[^f]..|.[^o].|..[^o])$
a sequence of characters:
PCRE (match any text but cat): /cat(*SKIP)(*FAIL)|[^c]*(?:c(?!at)[^c]*)*/i or /cat(*SKIP)(*FAIL)|(?:(?!cat).)+/is
Other engines allowing lookarounds: (cat)|[^c]*(?:c(?!at)[^c]*)* (or (?s)(cat)|(?:(?!cat).)*, or (cat)|[^c]+(?:c(?!at)[^c]*)*|(?:c(?!at)[^c]*)+[^c]*) and then check with language means: if Group 1 matched, it is not what we need, else, grab the match value if not empty
a certain single character or a set of characters:
Use a negated character class: [^a-z]+ (any char other than a lowercase ASCII letter)
Matching any char(s) but |: [^|]+
Demo note: the newline \n is used inside negated character classes in demos to avoid match overflow to the neighboring line(s). They are not necessary when testing individual strings.
Anchor note: In many languages, use \A to define the unambiguous start of string, and \z (in Python, it is \Z, in JavaScript, $ is OK) to define the very end of the string.
Dot note: In many flavors (but not POSIX, TRE, TCL), . matches any char but a newline char. Make sure you use a corresponding DOTALL modifier (/s in PCRE/Boost/.NET/Python/Java and /m in Ruby) for the . to match any char including a newline.
Backslash note: In languages where you have to declare patterns with C strings allowing escape sequences (like \n for a newline), you need to double the backslashes escaping special characters so that the engine could treat them as literal characters (e.g. in Java, world\. will be declared as "world\\.", or use a character class: "world[.]"). Use raw string literals (Python r'\bworld\b'), C# verbatim string literals #"world\.", or slashy strings/regex literal notations like /world\./.
You could use a negative lookahead from the start, e.g., ^(?!foo).*$ shouldn't match anything starting with foo.
You can put a ^ in the beginning of a character set to match anything but those characters.
[^=]*
will match everything but =
Just match /^index\.php/, and then reject whatever matches it.
In Python:
>>> import re
>>> p='^(?!index\.php\?[0-9]+).*$'
>>> s1='index.php?12345'
>>> re.match(p,s1)
>>> s2='index.html?12345'
>>> re.match(p,s2)
<_sre.SRE_Match object at 0xb7d65fa8>
Came across this thread after a long search. I had this problem for multiple searches and replace of some occurrences. But the pattern I used was matching till the end. Example below
import re
text = "start![image]xxx(xx.png) yyy xx![image]xxx(xxx.png) end"
replaced_text = re.sub(r'!\[image\](.*)\(.*\.png\)', '*', text)
print(replaced_text)
gave
start* end
Basically, the regex was matching from the first ![image] to the last .png, swallowing the middle yyy
Used the method posted above https://stackoverflow.com/a/17761124/429476 by Firish to break the match between the occurrence. Here the space is not matched; as the words are separated by space.
replaced_text = re.sub(r'!\[image\]([^ ]*)\([^ ]*\.png\)', '*', text)
and got what I wanted
start* yyy xx* end
I need a regex that will only find matches where the entire string matches my query.
For instance if I do a search for movies with the name "Red October" I only want to match on that exact title (case insensitive) but not match titles like "The Hunt For Red October". Not quite sure I know how to do this. Anyone know?
Thanks!
Try the following regular expression:
^Red October$
By default, regular expressions are case sensitive. The ^ marks the start of the matching text and $ the end.
Generally, and with default settings, ^ and $ anchors are a good way of ensuring that a regex matches an entire string.
A few caveats, though:
If you have alternation in your regex, be sure to enclose your regex in a non-capturing group before surrounding it with ^ and $:
^foo|bar$
is of course different from
^(?:foo|bar)$
Also, ^ and $ can take on a different meaning (start/end of line instead of start/end of string) if certain options are set. In text editors that support regular expressions, this is usually the default behaviour. In some languages, especially Ruby, this behaviour cannot even be switched off.
Therefore there is another set of anchors that are guaranteed to only match at the start/end of the entire string:
\A matches at the start of the string.
\Z matches at the end of the string or before a final line break.
\z matches at the very end of the string.
But not all languages support these anchors, most notably JavaScript.
I know that this may be a little late to answer this, but maybe it will come handy for someone else.
Simplest way:
var someString = "...";
var someRegex = "...";
var match = Regex.Match(someString , someRegex );
if(match.Success && match.Value.Length == someString.Length){
//pass
} else {
//fail
}
Use the ^ and $ modifiers to denote where the regex pattern sits relative to the start and end of the string:
Regex.Match("Red October", "^Red October$"); // pass
Regex.Match("The Hunt for Red October", "^Red October$"); // fail
You need to enclose your regex in ^ (start of string) and $ (end of string):
^Red October$
If the string may contain regex metasymbols (. { } ( ) $ etc), I propose to use
^\QYourString\E$
\Q starts quoting all the characters until \E.
Otherwise the regex can be unappropriate or even invalid.
If the language uses regex as string parameter (as I see in the example), double slash should be used:
^\\QYourString\\E$
Hope this tip helps somebody.
Sorry, but that's a little unclear.
From what i read, you want to do simple string compare. You don't need regex for that.
string myTest = "Red October";
bool isMatch = (myTest.ToLower() == "Red October".ToLower());
Console.WriteLine(isMatch);
isMatch = (myTest.ToLower() == "The Hunt for Red October".ToLower());
You can do it like this Exemple if i only want to catch one time the letter minus a in a string and it can be check with myRegex.IsMatch()
^[^e][e]{1}[^e]$
I need to check wether matching parenthesis is present in a string that might have emoticons (like :) or :(). For example, "(:)())()", "(abcd)()ghijk)((mnop)qert)"
I have used the patterns "^[:\\(|:\\)]" to check for emoticons and "\\([^()]*\\)" to check for matching parenthesis present, but they are not detected. How can I do this?
The really simple solution to this problem is to count the parentheses, trying to solve it with regular expressions is hard though extended regular expressions can handle it. Here is a sketch of the simple algorithm:
Set openParenthesisCount to 0
Iterate over the string:
If current character is ( increment openParenthesisCount
If current character is ) decrement openParenthesisCount, if count goes negative then fail (too many closing)
If current character is : lookahead and skip next character if it is a parenthesis (skip smilies)
If openParenthesisCount is zero => succeed
HTH
As far as I can tell, you want to match a string if and only if it contains matching parentheses, after ignoring every occurrence of ":)" and ":(" in the string, if any.
So, try this:
^((?!:).)*\(.*(?<!:)\).*
It will match the following strings:
()
(abd)
(())(
(:))
(:(:))
(:)())()
(abcd)()ghijk)((mnop)qert)
(abc):
(:abc)
But will NOT match the following:
)(
(:)
(:(
:(:)
:()
(:)
:()(:)
(
)
(abc
abc)
(abc:)
:(abc)
I am writing a parse for a script language.
I need to recognize strings, integers and floats.
I successfully recognize strings with the rule:
[a-zA-Z0-9_]+ {return STRING;}
But I have problem recognizing Integers and Floats. These are the (wrong) rules I wrote:
["+"|"-"][1-9]{DIGIT}* { return INTEGER;}
["+"|"-"]["0." | [1-9]{DIGIT}*"."]{DIGIT}+ {return FLOAT;}
How can I fix them?
Furthermore, since a "abc123" is a valid string, how can I make sure that it is recognized as a string and not as the concatenation of a string ("abc") and an Integer ("123") ?
First problem: There's a difference between (...) and [...]. Your regular expressions don't do what you think they do because you're using the wrong punctuation.
Beyond that:
No numeric rule recognizes 0.
Both numeric rules require an explicit sign.
Your STRING rule recognizes integers.
So, to start:
[...] encloses a set of individual characters or character ranges. It matches a single character which is a member of the set.
(...) encloses a regular expression. The parentheses are used for grouping, as in mathematics.
"..." encloses a sequence of individual characters, and matches exactly those characters.
With that in mind, let's look at
["+"|"-"][1-9]{DIGIT}*
The first bracket expression ["+"|"-"] is a set of individual characters or ranges. In this case, the set contains: ", +, " (again, which has no effect because a set contains zero or one instances of each member), |, and the range "-", which is a range whose endpoints are the same character, and consequently only includes that character, ", which is already in the set. In short, that was equivalent to ["+|]. It will match one of those three characters. It requires one of those three characters, in fact.
The second bracket expression [1-9] matches one character in the range 1-9, so it probably does what you expected. Again, it matches exactly one character.
Finally, {DIGIT} matches the expansion of the name DIGIT. I'll assume that you have the definition:
DIGIT [0-9]
somewhere in your definitions section. (In passing, I note that you could have just used the character class [:digit:], which would have been unambiguous, and you would not have needed to define it.) It's followed by a *, which means that it will match zero or more repetitions of the {DIGIT} definition.
Now, an example of a string which matches that pattern:
|42
And some examples of strings which don't match that pattern:
-7 # The pattern must start with |, + or "
42 # Again, the pattern must start with |, + or "
+0 # The character following the + must be in the range [0-9]
Similarly, your float pattern, once the [...] expressions are simplified, becomes (writing out the individual pieces one per line, to make it more obvious):
["+|] # i.e. the set " + |
["0.|[1-9] # i.e. the set " 0 | [ 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
{DIGIT}* # Any number of digits
"." # A single period
] # A single ]
{DIGIT}+ # one or more digits
So here's a possible match:
"..]3
I'll skip over writing out the solution because I think you'll benefit more from doing it yourself.
Now, the other issues:
Some rule should match 0. If you don't want to allow leading zeros, you'll need to just a it as a separate rule.
Use the optional operator (?) to indicate that the preceding object is optional. eg. "foo"? matches either the three characters f, o, o (in order) or matches the empty string. You can use that to make the sign optional.
The problem is not the matching of abc123, as in your question. (F)lex always gives you the longest possible match, and the only rule which could match the starting character a is the string rule, so it will allow the string rule to continue as long as it can. It will always match all of abc123. However, it will also match 123, which you would probably prefer to be matched by your numeric rule. Here, the other (f)lex matching criterion comes into play: when there are two or more rules which could match exactly the same string, and none of the rules can match a longer string, (f)lex chooses the first rule in the file. So if you want to give numbers priority over strings, you have to put the number rule earlier in your (f)lex file than the string rule.
I hope that gives you some ideas about how to fix things.