The dot (or period), C<.> is probably the most used, and certainly
the most well-known character class. By default, a dot matches any
-character, except for the newline. The default can be changed to
-add matching the newline by using the I<single line> modifier: either
+character, except for the newline. That default can be changed to
+add matching the newline by using the I<single line> modifier:
for the entire regular expression with the C</s> modifier, or
-locally with C<(?s)>. (The experimental C<\N> backslash sequence, described
+locally with C<(?s)> (and even globally within the scope of
+L<C<use re '/s'>|re/'E<sol>flags' mode>). (The C<L</\N>> backslash
+sequence, described
below, matches any character except newline without regard to the
I<single line> modifier.)
\H Match a character that isn't horizontal whitespace.
\v Match a vertical whitespace character.
\V Match a character that isn't vertical whitespace.
- \N Match a character that isn't a newline. Experimental.
+ \N Match a character that isn't a newline.
\pP, \p{Prop} Match a character that has the given Unicode property.
\PP, \P{Prop} Match a character that doesn't have the Unicode property
+=head3 \N
+
+C<\N>, available starting in v5.12, like the dot, matches any
+character that is not a newline. The difference is that C<\N> is not influenced
+by the I<single line> regular expression modifier (see L</The dot> above). Note
+that the form C<\N{...}> may mean something completely different. When the
+C<{...}> is a L<quantifier|perlre/Quantifiers>, it means to match a non-newline
+character that many times. For example, C<\N{3}> means to match 3
+non-newlines; C<\N{5,}> means to match 5 or more non-newlines. But if C<{...}>
+is not a legal quantifier, it is presumed to be a named character. See
+L<charnames> for those. For example, none of C<\N{COLON}>, C<\N{4F}>, and
+C<\N{F4}> contain legal quantifiers, so Perl will try to find characters whose
+names are respectively C<COLON>, C<4F>, and C<F4>.
+
=head3 Digits
C<\d> matches a single character considered to be a decimal I<digit>.
-If the C</a> modifier in effect, it matches [0-9]. Otherwise, it
+If the C</a> regular expression modifier is in effect, it matches [0-9].
+Otherwise, it
matches anything that is matched by C<\p{Digit}>, which includes [0-9].
(An unlikely possible exception is that under locale matching rules, the
-current locale might not have [0-9] matched by C<\d>, and/or might match
-other characters whose code point is less than 256. Such a locale
-definition would be in violation of the C language standard, but Perl
-doesn't currently assume anything in regard to this.)
+current locale might not have C<[0-9]> matched by C<\d>, and/or might match
+other characters whose code point is less than 256. The only such locale
+definitions that are legal would be to match C<[0-9]> plus another set of
+10 consecutive digit characters; anything else would be in violation of
+the C language standard, but Perl doesn't currently assume anything in
+regard to this.)
What this means is that unless the C</a> modifier is in effect C<\d> not
only matches the digits '0' - '9', but also Arabic, Devanagari, and
is expecting only the ASCII digits might be misled, or if the match is
C<\d+>, the matched string might contain a mixture of digits from
different writing systems that look like they signify a number different
-than they actually do. L<Unicode::UCD/num()> can be used to safely
+than they actually do. L<Unicode::UCD/num()> can
+be used to safely
calculate the value, returning C<undef> if the input string contains
such a mixture.
to characters that match the other type of "digit",
C<\p{Numeric_Type=Digit}>, and so C<\d> doesn't match them.
-In Unicode 5.2, the Tamil digits (U+0BE6 - U+0BEF) can also legally be
+The Tamil digits (U+0BE6 - U+0BEF) can also legally be
used in old-style Tamil numbers in which they would appear no more than
one in a row, separated by characters that mean "times 10", "times 100",
etc. (See L<http://www.unicode.org/notes/tn21>.)
=head3 Word characters
A C<\w> matches a single alphanumeric character (an alphabetic character, or a
-decimal digit) or a connecting punctuation character, such as an
-underscore ("_"). It does not match a whole word. To match a whole
-word, use C<\w+>. This isn't the same thing as matching an English word, but
-in the ASCII range it is the same as a string of Perl-identifier
-characters.
+decimal digit); or a connecting punctuation character, such as an
+underscore ("_"); or a "mark" character (like some sort of accent) that
+attaches to one of those. It does not match a whole word. To match a
+whole word, use C<\w+>. This isn't the same thing as matching an
+English word, but in the ASCII range it is the same as a string of
+Perl-identifier characters.
=over
C<\w> matches the platform's native underscore character plus whatever
the locale considers to be alphanumeric.
-=item if Unicode rules are in effect or if on an EBCDIC platform ...
+=item if instead, Unicode rules are in effect ...
C<\w> matches exactly what C<\p{Word}> matches.
Also, for a somewhat finer-grained set of characters that are in programming
language identifiers beyond the ASCII range, you may wish to instead use the
-more customized Unicode properties, "ID_Start", ID_Continue", "XID_Start", and
-"XID_Continue". See L<http://unicode.org/reports/tr31>.
+more customized L</Unicode Properties>, C<\p{ID_Start}>,
+C<\p{ID_Continue}>, C<\p{XID_Start}>, and C<\p{XID_Continue}>. See
+L<http://unicode.org/reports/tr31>.
Any character not matched by C<\w> is matched by C<\W>.
=item If the C</a> modifier is in effect ...
-C<\s> matches the 5 characters [\t\n\f\r ]; that is, the horizontal tab,
-the newline, the form feed, the carriage return, and the space. (Note
-that it doesn't match the vertical tab, C<\cK> on ASCII platforms.)
+In all Perl versions, C<\s> matches the 5 characters [\t\n\f\r ]; that
+is, the horizontal tab,
+the newline, the form feed, the carriage return, and the space.
+Starting in Perl v5.18, it also matches the vertical tab, C<\cK>.
+See note C<[1]> below for a discussion of this.
=item otherwise ...
=item if locale rules are in effect ...
-C<\s> matches whatever the locale considers to be whitespace. Note that
-this is likely to include the vertical space, unlike non-locale C<\s>
-matching.
+C<\s> matches whatever the locale considers to be whitespace.
-=item if Unicode rules are in effect or if on an EBCDIC platform ...
+=item if instead, Unicode rules are in effect ...
C<\s> matches exactly the characters shown with an "s" column in the
table below.
=item otherwise ...
-C<\s> matches [\t\n\f\r ].
+C<\s> matches [\t\n\f\r ] and, starting in Perl
+v5.18, the vertical tab, C<\cK>.
+(See note C<[1]> below for a discussion of this.)
Note that this list doesn't include the non-breaking space.
=back
Any character not matched by C<\s> is matched by C<\S>.
C<\h> matches any character considered horizontal whitespace;
-this includes the space and tab characters and several others
+this includes the platform's space and tab characters and several others
listed in the table below. C<\H> matches any character
-not considered horizontal whitespace.
+not considered horizontal whitespace. They use the platform's native
+character set, and do not consider any locale that may otherwise be in
+use.
C<\v> matches any character considered vertical whitespace;
-this includes the carriage return and line feed characters (newline)
+this includes the platform's carriage return and line feed characters (newline)
plus several other characters, all listed in the table below.
C<\V> matches any character not considered vertical whitespace.
+They use the platform's native character set, and do not consider any
+locale that may otherwise be in use.
C<\R> matches anything that can be considered a newline under Unicode
-rules. It's not a character class, as it can match a multi-character
-sequence. Therefore, it cannot be used inside a bracketed character
-class; use C<\v> instead (vertical whitespace).
+rules. It can match a multi-character sequence. It cannot be used inside
+a bracketed character class; use C<\v> instead (vertical whitespace).
+It uses the platform's
+native character set, and does not consider any locale that may
+otherwise be in use.
Details are discussed in L<perlrebackslash>.
Note that unlike C<\s> (and C<\d> and C<\w>), C<\h> and C<\v> always match
-the same characters, without regard to other factors, such as whether the
-source string is in UTF-8 format.
+the same characters, without regard to other factors, such as the active
+locale or whether the source string is in UTF-8 format.
-One might think that C<\s> is equivalent to C<[\h\v]>. This is not true.
-For example, the vertical tab (C<"\x0b">) is not matched by C<\s>, it is
-however considered vertical whitespace.
+One might think that C<\s> is equivalent to C<[\h\v]>. This is indeed true
+starting in Perl v5.18, but prior to that, the sole difference was that the
+vertical tab (C<"\cK">) was not matched by C<\s>.
The following table is a complete listing of characters matched by
-C<\s>, C<\h> and C<\v> as of Unicode 6.0.
+C<\s>, C<\h> and C<\v> as of Unicode 6.3.
-The first column gives the code point of the character (in hex format),
+The first column gives the Unicode code point of the character (in hex format),
the second column gives the (Unicode) name. The third column indicates
-by which class(es) the character is matched (assuming no locale or EBCDIC code
-page is in effect that changes the C<\s> matching).
-
- 0x00009 CHARACTER TABULATION h s
- 0x0000a LINE FEED (LF) vs
- 0x0000b LINE TABULATION v
- 0x0000c FORM FEED (FF) vs
- 0x0000d CARRIAGE RETURN (CR) vs
- 0x00020 SPACE h s
- 0x00085 NEXT LINE (NEL) vs [1]
- 0x000a0 NO-BREAK SPACE h s [1]
- 0x01680 OGHAM SPACE MARK h s
- 0x0180e MONGOLIAN VOWEL SEPARATOR h s
- 0x02000 EN QUAD h s
- 0x02001 EM QUAD h s
- 0x02002 EN SPACE h s
- 0x02003 EM SPACE h s
- 0x02004 THREE-PER-EM SPACE h s
- 0x02005 FOUR-PER-EM SPACE h s
- 0x02006 SIX-PER-EM SPACE h s
- 0x02007 FIGURE SPACE h s
- 0x02008 PUNCTUATION SPACE h s
- 0x02009 THIN SPACE h s
- 0x0200a HAIR SPACE h s
- 0x02028 LINE SEPARATOR vs
- 0x02029 PARAGRAPH SEPARATOR vs
- 0x0202f NARROW NO-BREAK SPACE h s
- 0x0205f MEDIUM MATHEMATICAL SPACE h s
- 0x03000 IDEOGRAPHIC SPACE h s
+by which class(es) the character is matched (assuming no locale is in
+effect that changes the C<\s> matching).
+
+ 0x0009 CHARACTER TABULATION h s
+ 0x000a LINE FEED (LF) vs
+ 0x000b LINE TABULATION vs [1]
+ 0x000c FORM FEED (FF) vs
+ 0x000d CARRIAGE RETURN (CR) vs
+ 0x0020 SPACE h s
+ 0x0085 NEXT LINE (NEL) vs [2]
+ 0x00a0 NO-BREAK SPACE h s [2]
+ 0x1680 OGHAM SPACE MARK h s
+ 0x2000 EN QUAD h s
+ 0x2001 EM QUAD h s
+ 0x2002 EN SPACE h s
+ 0x2003 EM SPACE h s
+ 0x2004 THREE-PER-EM SPACE h s
+ 0x2005 FOUR-PER-EM SPACE h s
+ 0x2006 SIX-PER-EM SPACE h s
+ 0x2007 FIGURE SPACE h s
+ 0x2008 PUNCTUATION SPACE h s
+ 0x2009 THIN SPACE h s
+ 0x200a HAIR SPACE h s
+ 0x2028 LINE SEPARATOR vs
+ 0x2029 PARAGRAPH SEPARATOR vs
+ 0x202f NARROW NO-BREAK SPACE h s
+ 0x205f MEDIUM MATHEMATICAL SPACE h s
+ 0x3000 IDEOGRAPHIC SPACE h s
=over 4
=item [1]
+Prior to Perl v5.18, C<\s> did not match the vertical tab.
+C<[^\S\cK]> (obscurely) matches what C<\s> traditionally did.
+
+=item [2]
+
NEXT LINE and NO-BREAK SPACE may or may not match C<\s> depending
on the rules in effect. See
L<the beginning of this section|/Whitespace>.
=back
-=head3 \N
-
-C<\N> is new in 5.12, and is experimental. It, like the dot, matches any
-character that is not a newline. The difference is that C<\N> is not influenced
-by the I<single line> regular expression modifier (see L</The dot> above). Note
-that the form C<\N{...}> may mean something completely different. When the
-C<{...}> is a L<quantifier|perlre/Quantifiers>, it means to match a non-newline
-character that many times. For example, C<\N{3}> means to match 3
-non-newlines; C<\N{5,}> means to match 5 or more non-newlines. But if C<{...}>
-is not a legal quantifier, it is presumed to be a named character. See
-L<charnames> for those. For example, none of C<\N{COLON}>, C<\N{4F}>, and
-C<\N{F4}> contain legal quantifiers, so Perl will try to find characters whose
-names are respectively C<COLON>, C<4F>, and C<F4>.
-
=head3 Unicode Properties
C<\pP> and C<\p{Prop}> are character classes to match characters that fit given
For instance, a match for a number can be written as C</\pN/> or as
C</\p{Number}/>, or as C</\p{Number=True}/>.
Lowercase letters are matched by the property I<Lowercase_Letter> which
-has as short form I<Ll>. They need the braces, so are written as C</\p{Ll}/> or
+has the short form I<Ll>. They need the braces, so are written as C</\p{Ll}/> or
C</\p{Lowercase_Letter}/>, or C</\p{General_Category=Lowercase_Letter}/>
(the underscores are optional).
C</\pLl/> is valid, but means something different.
It matches a two character string: a letter (Unicode property C<\pL>),
followed by a lowercase C<l>.
-If neither the C</a> modifier nor locale rules are in effect, the use of
+If locale rules are not in effect, the use of
a Unicode property will force the regular expression into using Unicode
-rules.
+rules, if it isn't already.
Note that almost all properties are immune to case-insensitive matching.
That is, adding a C</i> regular expression modifier does not change what
and C<Titlecase>,
all of which match C<Cased> under C</i> matching.
(The difference between these sets is that some things, such as Roman
-Numerals, come in both upper and lower case so they are C<Cased>, but
+numerals, come in both upper and lower case, so they are C<Cased>, but
aren't considered to be letters, so they aren't C<Cased_Letter>s. They're
actually C<Letter_Number>s.)
This set also includes its subsets C<PosixUpper> and C<PosixLower>, both
-of which under C</i> match
ing match C<PosixAlpha>.
+of which under C</i> match C<PosixAlpha>.
For more details on Unicode properties, see L<perlunicode/Unicode
Character Properties>; for a
It is also possible to define your own properties. This is discussed in
L<perlunicode/User-Defined Character Properties>.
+Unicode properties are defined (surprise!) only on Unicode code points.
+Starting in v5.20, when matching against C<\p> and C<\P>, Perl treats
+non-Unicode code points (those above the legal Unicode maximum of
+0x10FFFF) as if they were typical unassigned Unicode code points.
+
+Prior to v5.20, Perl raised a warning and made all matches fail on
+non-Unicode code points. This could be somewhat surprising:
+
+ chr(0x110000) =~ \p{ASCII_Hex_Digit=True} # Fails on Perls < v5.20.
+ chr(0x110000) =~ \p{ASCII_Hex_Digit=False} # Also fails on Perls
+ # < v5.20
+
+Even though these two matches might be thought of as complements, until
+v5.20 they were so only on Unicode code points.
+
=head4 Examples
"a" =~ /\w/ # Match, "a" is a 'word' character.
-------
-* There is an exception to a bracketed character class matching a only a
-single character. When the class is to match caselessely under C</i>
-matching rules, and a character inside the class matches a
+* There are two exceptions to a bracketed character class matching a
+single character only. Each requires special handling by Perl to make
+things work:
+
+=over
+
+=item *
+
+When the class is to match caselessly under C</i> matching rules, and a
+character that is explicitly mentioned inside the class matches a
multiple-character sequence caselessly under Unicode rules, the class
-(when not L<inverted|/Negation>) will also match that sequence. For
-example, Unicode says that the letter C<LATIN SMALL LETTER SHARP S>
-should match the sequence C<ss> under C</i> rules. Thus,
+will also match that sequence. For example, Unicode says that the
+letter C<LATIN SMALL LETTER SHARP S> should match the sequence C<ss>
+under C</i> rules. Thus,
'ss' =~ /\A\N{LATIN SMALL LETTER SHARP S}\z/i # Matches
'ss' =~ /\A[aeioust\N{LATIN SMALL LETTER SHARP S}]\z/i # Matches
+For this to happen, the class must not be inverted (see L</Negation>)
+and the character must be explicitly specified, and not be part of a
+multi-character range (not even as one of its endpoints). (L</Character
+Ranges> will be explained shortly.) Therefore,
+
+ 'ss' =~ /\A[\0-\x{ff}]\z/ui # Doesn't match
+ 'ss' =~ /\A[\0-\N{LATIN SMALL LETTER SHARP S}]\z/ui # No match
+ 'ss' =~ /\A[\xDF-\xDF]\z/ui # Matches on ASCII platforms, since
+ # \xDF is LATIN SMALL LETTER SHARP S,
+ # and the range is just a single
+ # element
+
+Note that it isn't a good idea to specify these types of ranges anyway.
+
+=item *
+
+Some names known to C<\N{...}> refer to a sequence of multiple characters,
+instead of the usual single character. When one of these is included in
+the class, the entire sequence is matched. For example,
+
+ "\N{TAMIL LETTER KA}\N{TAMIL VOWEL SIGN AU}"
+ =~ / ^ [\N{TAMIL SYLLABLE KAU}] $ /x;
+
+matches, because C<\N{TAMIL SYLLABLE KAU}> is a named sequence
+consisting of the two characters matched against. Like the other
+instance where a bracketed class can match multiple characters, and for
+similar reasons, the class must not be inverted, and the named sequence
+may not appear in a range, even one where it is both endpoints. If
+these happen, it is a fatal error if the character class is within the
+scope of L<C<use re 'strict>|re/'strict' mode>, or within an extended
+L<C<(?[...])>|/Extended Bracketed Character Classes> class; otherwise
+only the first code point is used (with a C<regexp>-type warning
+raised).
+
+=back
+
=head3 Special Characters Inside a Bracketed Character Class
Most characters that are meta characters in regular expressions (that
their special meaning and can be used inside a character class without
the need to escape them. For instance, C<[()]> matches either an opening
parenthesis, or a closing parenthesis, and the parens inside the character
-class don't group or capture.
+class don't group or capture. Be aware that, unless the pattern is
+evaluated in single-quotish context, variable interpolation will take
+place before the bracketed class is parsed:
+
+ $, = "\t| ";
+ $a =~ m'[$,]'; # single-quotish: matches '$' or ','
+ $a =~ q{[$,]}' # same
+ $a =~ m/[$,]/; # double-quotish: matches "\t", "|", or " "
Characters that may carry a special meaning inside a character class are:
C<\>, C<^>, C<->, C<[> and C<]>, and are discussed below. They can be
and
C<\x>
are also special and have the same meanings as they do outside a
-bracketed character class. (However, inside a bracketed character
-class, if C<\N{I<NAME>}> expands to a sequence of characters, only the first
-one in the sequence is used, with a warning.)
+bracketed character class.
Also, a backslash followed by two or three octal digits is considered an octal
number.
"+" =~ /[+?*]/ # Match, "+" in a character class is not special.
"\cH" =~ /[\b]/ # Match, \b inside in a character class
# is equivalent to a backspace.
- "]" =~ /[][]/ # Match, as the character class contains.
+ "]" =~ /[][]/ # Match, as the character class contains
# both [ and ].
"[]" =~ /[[]]/ # Match, the pattern contains a character class
- # containing just ], and the character class is
+ # containing just [, and the character class is
# followed by a ].
+=head3 Bracketed Character Classes and the C</xx> pattern modifier
+
+Normally SPACE and TAB characters have no special meaning inside a
+bracketed character class; they are just added to the list of characters
+matched by the class. But if the L<C</xx>|perlre/E<sol>x and E<sol>xx>
+pattern modifier is in effect, they are generally ignored and can be
+added to improve readability. They can't be added in the middle of a
+single construct:
+
+ / [ \x{10 FFFF} ] /xx # WRONG!
+
+The SPACE in the middle of the hex constant is illegal.
+
+To specify a literal SPACE character, you can escape it with a
+backslash, like:
+
+ /[ a e i o u \ ]/xx
+
+This matches the English vowels plus the SPACE character.
+
+For clarity, you should already have been using C<\t> to specify a
+literal tab, and C<\t> is unaffected by C</xx>.
+
=head3 Character Ranges
It is not uncommon to want to match a range of characters. Luckily, instead
If inside a bracketed character class you have two characters separated
by a hyphen, it's treated as if all characters between the two were in
the class. For instance, C<[0-9]> matches any ASCII digit, and C<[a-m]>
-matches any lowercase letter from the first half of the old ASCII alphabet.
+matches any lowercase letter from the first half of the ASCII alphabet.
Note that the two characters on either side of the hyphen are not
necessarily both letters or both digits. Any character is possible,
# hyphen ('-'), or the letter 'm'.
['-?] # Matches any of the characters '()*+,-./0123456789:;<=>?
# (But not on an EBCDIC platform).
-
+ [\N{APOSTROPHE}-\N{QUESTION MARK}]
+ # Matches any of the characters '()*+,-./0123456789:;<=>?
+ # even on an EBCDIC platform.
+ [\N{U+27}-\N{U+3F}] # Same. (U+27 is "'", and U+3F is "?")
+
+As the final two examples above show, you can achieve portablity to
+non-ASCII platforms by using the C<\N{...}> form for the range
+endpoints. These indicate that the specified range is to be interpreted
+using Unicode values, so C<[\N{U+27}-\N{U+3F}]> means to match
+C<\N{U+27}>, C<\N{U+28}>, C<\N{U+29}>, ..., C<\N{U+3D}>, C<\N{U+3E}>,
+and C<\N{U+3F}>, whatever the native code point versions for those are.
+These are called "Unicode" ranges. If either end is of the C<\N{...}>
+form, the range is considered Unicode. A C<regexp> warning is raised
+under C<S<"use re 'strict'">> if the other endpoint is specified
+non-portably:
+
+ [\N{U+00}-\x09] # Warning under re 'strict'; \x09 is non-portable
+ [\N{U+00}-\t] # No warning;
+
+Both of the above match the characters C<\N{U+00}> C<\N{U+01}>, ...
+C<\N{U+08}>, C<\N{U+09}>, but the C<\x09> looks like it could be a
+mistake so the warning is raised (under C<re 'strict'>) for it.
+
+Perl also guarantees that the ranges C<A-Z>, C<a-z>, C<0-9>, and any
+subranges of these match what an English-only speaker would expect them
+to match on any platform. That is, C<[A-Z]> matches the 26 ASCII
+uppercase letters;
+C<[a-z]> matches the 26 lowercase letters; and C<[0-9]> matches the 10
+digits. Subranges, like C<[h-k]>, match correspondingly, in this case
+just the four letters C<"h">, C<"i">, C<"j">, and C<"k">. This is the
+natural behavior on ASCII platforms where the code points (ordinal
+values) for C<"h"> through C<"k"> are consecutive integers (0x68 through
+0x6B). But special handling to achieve this may be needed on platforms
+with a non-ASCII native character set. For example, on EBCDIC
+platforms, the code point for C<"h"> is 0x88, C<"i"> is 0x89, C<"j"> is
+0x91, and C<"k"> is 0x92. Perl specially treats C<[h-k]> to exclude the
+seven code points in the gap: 0x8A through 0x90. This special handling is
+only invoked when the range is a subrange of one of the ASCII uppercase,
+lowercase, and digit ranges, AND each end of the range is expressed
+either as a literal, like C<"A">, or as a named character (C<\N{...}>,
+including the C<\N{U+...> form).
+
+EBCDIC Examples:
+
+ [i-j] # Matches either "i" or "j"
+ [i-\N{LATIN SMALL LETTER J}] # Same
+ [i-\N{U+6A}] # Same
+ [\N{U+69}-\N{U+6A}] # Same
+ [\x{89}-\x{91}] # Matches 0x89 ("i"), 0x8A .. 0x90, 0x91 ("j")
+ [i-\x{91}] # Same
+ [\x{89}-j] # Same
+ [i-J] # Matches, 0x89 ("i") .. 0xC1 ("J"); special
+ # handling doesn't apply because range is mixed
+ # case
=head3 Negation
It is also possible to instead list the characters you do not want to
match. You can do so by using a caret (C<^>) as the first character in the
character class. For instance, C<[^a-z]> matches any character that is not a
-lowercase ASCII letter, which therefore includes almost a hundred thousand
-Unicode letters. The class is said to be "negated" or "inverted".
+lowercase ASCII letter, which therefore includes more than a million
+Unicode code points. The class is said to be "negated" or "inverted".
This syntax make the caret a special character inside a bracketed character
class, but only if it is the first character of the class. So if you want
the caret as one of the characters to match, either escape the caret or
-else not list it first.
+else don't list it first.
In inverted bracketed character classes, Perl ignores the Unicode rules
-that normally say that a given character matches a sequence of multiple
-characters under caseless C</i> matching, which otherwise could be
-highly confusing:
+that normally say that named sequence, and certain characters should
+match a sequence of multiple characters use under caseless C</i>
+matching. Following those rules could lead to highly confusing
+situations:
- "ss" =~ /^[^\xDF]+$/ui;
+ "ss" =~ /^[^\xDF]+$/ui; # Matches!
This should match any sequences of characters that aren't C<\xDF> nor
what C<\xDF> matches under C</i>. C<"s"> isn't C<\xDF>, but Unicode
says that C<"ss"> is what C<\xDF> matches under C</i>. So which one
"wins"? Do you fail the match because the string has C<ss> or accept it
-because it has an C<s> followed by another C<s>?
+because it has an C<s> followed by another C<s>? Perl has chosen the
+latter. (See note in L</Bracketed Character Classes> above.)
Examples:
X<alpha> X<alnum> X<ascii> X<blank> X<cntrl> X<digit> X<graph>
X<lower> X<print> X<punct> X<space> X<upper> X<word> X<xdigit>
-POSIX character classes have the form C<[:class:]>, where I<class> is
+POSIX character classes have the form C<[:class:]>, where I<class> is the
name, and the C<[:> and C<:]> delimiters. POSIX character classes only appear
I<inside> bracketed character classes, and are a convenient and descriptive
way of listing a group of characters.
The latter pattern would be a character class consisting of a colon,
and the letters C<a>, C<l>, C<p> and C<h>.
+
POSIX character classes can be part of a larger bracketed character class.
For example,
Perl recognizes the following POSIX character classes:
alpha Any alphabetical character ("[A-Za-z]").
- alnum Any alphanumeric character. ("[A-Za-z0-9]")
+ alnum Any alphanumeric character ("[A-Za-z0-9]").
ascii Any character in the ASCII character set.
blank A GNU extension, equal to a space or a horizontal tab ("\t").
cntrl Any control character. See Note [2] below.
lower Any lowercase character ("[a-z]").
print Any printable character, including a space. See Note [4] below.
punct Any graphical character excluding "word" characters. Note [5].
- space Any whitespace character. "\s" plus the vertical tab ("\cK").
+ space Any whitespace character. "\s" including the vertical tab
+ ("\cK").
upper Any uppercase character ("[A-Z]").
word A Perl extension ("[A-Za-z0-9_]"), equivalent to "\w".
xdigit Any hexadecimal digit ("[0-9a-fA-F]").
+Like the L<Unicode properties|/Unicode Properties>, most of the POSIX
+properties match the same regardless of whether case-insensitive (C</i>)
+matching is in effect or not. The two exceptions are C<[:upper:]> and
+C<[:lower:]>. Under C</i>, they each match the union of C<[:upper:]> and
+C<[:lower:]>.
+
Most POSIX character classes have two Unicode-style C<\p> property
counterparts. (They are not official Unicode properties, but Perl extensions
derived from official Unicode properties.) The table below shows the relation
appropriate characters in the full Unicode character set. For example,
C<\p{Alpha}> matches not just the ASCII alphabetic characters, but any
character in the entire Unicode character set considered alphabetic.
-The column labelled "backslash sequence" is a (short) synonym for
-the Full-range Unicode form.
-
-(Each of the counterparts has various synonyms as well.
-L<perluniprops/Properties accessible through \p{} and \P{}> lists all
-synonyms, plus all characters matched by each ASCII-range property.
-For example, C<\p{AHex}> is a synonym for C<\p{ASCII_Hex_Digit}>,
-and any C<\p> property name can be prefixed with "Is" such as C<\p{IsAlpha}>.)
-
-Both the C<\p> counterparts always assume Unicode rules are in effect.
-On ASCII platforms, this means they assume that the code points from 128
-to 255 are Latin-1, and that means that using them under locale rules is
-unwise unless the locale is guaranteed to be Latin-1 or UTF-8. In contrast, the
-POSIX character classes are useful under locale rules. They are
-affected by the actual rules in effect, as follows:
-
-=over
-
-=item If the C</a> modifier, is in effect ...
-
-Each of the POSIX classes matches exactly the same as their ASCII-range
-counterparts.
-
-=item otherwise ...
-
-=over
-
-=item For code points above 255 ...
-
-The POSIX class matches the same as its Full-range counterpart.
-
-=item For code points below 256 ...
-
-=over
-
-=item if locale rules are in effect ...
-
-The POSIX class matches according to the locale.
-
-=item if Unicode rules are in effect or if on an EBCDIC platform ...
-
-The POSIX class matches the same as the Full-range counterpart.
-
-=item otherwise ...
-
-The POSIX class matches the same as the ASCII range counterpart.
-
-=back
-
-=back
-
-=back
-
-Which rules apply are determined as described in
-L<perlre/Which character set modifier is in effect?>.
-
-It is proposed to change this behavior in a future release of Perl so that
-whether or not Unicode rules are in effect would not change the
-behavior: Outside of locale or an EBCDIC code page, the POSIX classes
-would behave like their ASCII-range counterparts. If you wish to
-comment on this proposal, send email to C<perl5-porters@perl.org>.
+An entry in the column labelled "backslash sequence" is a (short)
+equivalent.
[[:...:]] ASCII-range Full-range backslash Note
Unicode Unicode sequence
Control characters don't produce output as such, but instead usually control
the terminal somehow: for example, newline and backspace are control characters.
-In the ASCII range, characters whose code points are between 0 and 31 inclusive,
-plus 127 (C<DEL>) are control characters.
-
-On EBCDIC platforms, it is likely that the code page will define C<[[:cntrl:]]>
-to be the EBCDIC equivalents of the ASCII controls, plus the controls
-that in Unicode have code pointss from 128 through 159.
+On ASCII platforms, in the ASCII range, characters whose code points are
+between 0 and 31 inclusive, plus 127 (C<DEL>) are control characters; on
+EBCDIC platforms, their counterparts are control characters.
=item [3]
The similarly named property, C<\p{Punct}>, matches a somewhat different
set in the ASCII range, namely
-C<[-!"#%&'()*,./:;?@[\\\]_{}]>. That is, it is missing C<[$+E<lt>=E<gt>^`|~]>.
+C<[-!"#%&'()*,./:;?@[\\\]_{}]>. That is, it is missing the nine
+characters C<[$+E<lt>=E<gt>^`|~]>.
This is because Unicode splits what POSIX considers to be punctuation into two
categories, Punctuation and Symbols.
-C<\p{XPosixPunct}> and (in Unicode mode) C<[[:punct:]]>, match what
+C<\p{XPosixPunct}> and (under Unicode rules) C<[[:punct:]]>, match what
C<\p{PosixPunct}> matches in the ASCII range, plus what C<\p{Punct}>
matches. This is different than strictly matching according to
C<\p{Punct}>. Another way to say it is that
=item [6]
-C<\p{SpacePerl}> and C<\p{Space}> differ only in that in non-locale
-matching, C<\p{Space}> additionally
-matches the vertical tab, C<\cK>. Same for the two ASCII-only range forms.
+C<\p{XPerlSpace}> and C<\p{Space}> match identically starting with Perl
+v5.18. In earlier versions, these differ only in that in non-locale
+matching, C<\p{XPerlSpace}> did not match the vertical tab, C<\cK>.
+Same for the two ASCII-only range forms.
=back
-There are various other synonyms that can be used for these besides
-C<\p{HorizSpace}> and \C<\p{XPosixBlank}>. For example,
-C<\p{PosixAlpha}> can be written as C<\p{Alpha}>. All are listed
-in L<perluniprops/Properties accessible through \p{} and \P{}>.
+There are various other synonyms that can be used besides the names
+listed in the table. For example, C<\p{XPosixAlpha}> can be written as
+C<\p{Alpha}>. All are listed in
+L<perluniprops/Properties accessible through \p{} and \P{}>.
+
+Both the C<\p> counterparts always assume Unicode rules are in effect.
+On ASCII platforms, this means they assume that the code points from 128
+to 255 are Latin-1, and that means that using them under locale rules is
+unwise unless the locale is guaranteed to be Latin-1 or UTF-8. In contrast, the
+POSIX character classes are useful under locale rules. They are
+affected by the actual rules in effect, as follows:
+
+=over
+
+=item If the C</a> modifier, is in effect ...
+
+Each of the POSIX classes matches exactly the same as their ASCII-range
+counterparts.
+
+=item otherwise ...
+
+=over
+
+=item For code points above 255 ...
+
+The POSIX class matches the same as its Full-range counterpart.
+
+=item For code points below 256 ...
+
+=over
+
+=item if locale rules are in effect ...
+
+The POSIX class matches according to the locale, except:
+
+=over
+
+=item C<word>
+
+also includes the platform's native underscore character, no matter what
+the locale is.
+
+=item C<ascii>
+
+on platforms that don't have the POSIX C<ascii> extension, this matches
+just the platform's native ASCII-range characters.
+
+=item C<blank>
+
+on platforms that don't have the POSIX C<blank> extension, this matches
+just the platform's native tab and space characters.
+
+=back
+
+=item if instead, Unicode rules are in effect ...
+
+The POSIX class matches the same as the Full-range counterpart.
+
+=item otherwise ...
+
+The POSIX class matches the same as the ASCII range counterpart.
+
+=back
+
+=back
+
+=back
+
+Which rules apply are determined as described in
+L<perlre/Which character set modifier is in effect?>.
+
+It is proposed to change this behavior in a future release of Perl so that
+whether or not Unicode rules are in effect would not change the
+behavior: Outside of locale, the POSIX classes
+would behave like their ASCII-range counterparts. If you wish to
+comment on this proposal, send email to C<perl5-porters@perl.org>.
=head4 Negation of POSIX character classes
X<character class, negation>
/[01[:lower:]]/ # Matches a character that is either a
# lowercase letter, or '0' or '1'.
/[[:digit:][:^xdigit:]]/ # Matches a character that can be anything
- # except the letters 'a' to 'f'. This is
- # because the main character class is composed
- # of two POSIX character classes that are ORed
- # together, one that matches any digit, and
- # the other that matches anything that isn't a
- # hex digit. The result matches all
- # characters except the letters 'a' to 'f' and
- # 'A' to 'F'.
+ # except the letters 'a' to 'f' and 'A' to
+ # 'F'. This is because the main character
+ # class is composed of two POSIX character
+ # classes that are ORed together, one that
+ # matches any digit, and the other that
+ # matches anything that isn't a hex digit.
+ # The OR adds the digits, leaving only the
+ # letters 'a' to 'f' and 'A' to 'F' excluded.
+
+=head3 Extended Bracketed Character Classes
+X<character class>
+X<set operations>
+
+This is a fancy bracketed character class that can be used for more
+readable and less error-prone classes, and to perform set operations,
+such as intersection. An example is
+
+ /(?[ \p{Thai} & \p{Digit} ])/
+
+This will match all the digit characters that are in the Thai script.
+
+This is an experimental feature available starting in 5.18, and is
+subject to change as we gain field experience with it. Any attempt to
+use it will raise a warning, unless disabled via
+
+ no warnings "experimental::regex_sets";
+
+Comments on this feature are welcome; send email to
+C<perl5-porters@perl.org>.
+
+The rules used by L<C<use re 'strict>|re/'strict' mode> apply to this
+construct.
+
+We can extend the example above:
+
+ /(?[ ( \p{Thai} + \p{Lao} ) & \p{Digit} ])/
+
+This matches digits that are in either the Thai or Laotian scripts.
+
+Notice the white space in these examples. This construct always has
+the C<E<sol>xx> modifier turned on within it.
+
+The available binary operators are:
+
+ & intersection
+ + union
+ | another name for '+', hence means union
+ - subtraction (the result matches the set consisting of those
+ code points matched by the first operand, excluding any that
+ are also matched by the second operand)
+ ^ symmetric difference (the union minus the intersection). This
+ is like an exclusive or, in that the result is the set of code
+ points that are matched by either, but not both, of the
+ operands.
+
+There is one unary operator:
+
+ ! complement
+
+All the binary operators left associate; C<"&"> is higher precedence
+than the others, which all have equal precedence. The unary operator
+right associates, and has highest precedence. Thus this follows the
+normal Perl precedence rules for logical operators. Use parentheses to
+override the default precedence and associativity.
+
+The main restriction is that everything is a metacharacter. Thus,
+you cannot refer to single characters by doing something like this:
+
+ /(?[ a + b ])/ # Syntax error!
+
+The easiest way to specify an individual typable character is to enclose
+it in brackets:
+
+ /(?[ [a] + [b] ])/
+
+(This is the same thing as C<[ab]>.) You could also have said the
+equivalent:
+
+ /(?[[ a b ]])/
+
+(You can, of course, specify single characters by using, C<\x{...}>,
+C<\N{...}>, etc.)
+
+This last example shows the use of this construct to specify an ordinary
+bracketed character class without additional set operations. Note the
+white space within it. This is allowed because C<E<sol>xx> is
+automatically turned on within this construct.
+
+All the other escapes accepted by normal bracketed character classes are
+accepted here as well.
+
+Because this construct compiles under
+L<C<use re 'strict>|re/'strict' mode>, unrecognized escapes that
+generate warnings in normal classes are fatal errors here, as well as
+all other warnings from these class elements, as well as some
+practices that don't currently warn outside C<re 'strict'>. For example
+you cannot say
+
+ /(?[ [ \xF ] ])/ # Syntax error!
+
+You have to have two hex digits after a braceless C<\x> (use a leading
+zero to make two). These restrictions are to lower the incidence of
+typos causing the class to not match what you thought it would.
+
+If a regular bracketed character class contains a C<\p{}> or C<\P{}> and
+is matched against a non-Unicode code point, a warning may be
+raised, as the result is not Unicode-defined. No such warning will come
+when using this extended form.
+
+The final difference between regular bracketed character classes and
+these, is that it is not possible to get these to match a
+multi-character fold. Thus,
+
+ /(?[ [\xDF] ])/iu
+
+does not match the string C<ss>.
+
+You don't have to enclose POSIX class names inside double brackets,
+hence both of the following work:
+
+ /(?[ [:word:] - [:lower:] ])/
+ /(?[ [[:word:]] - [[:lower:]] ])/
+
+Any contained POSIX character classes, including things like C<\w> and C<\D>
+respect the C<E<sol>a> (and C<E<sol>aa>) modifiers.
+
+C<< (?[ ]) >> is a regex-compile-time construct. Any attempt to use
+something which isn't knowable at the time the containing regular
+expression is compiled is a fatal error. In practice, this means
+just three limitations:
+
+=over 4
+
+=item 1
+
+When compiled within the scope of C<use locale> (or the C<E<sol>l> regex
+modifier), this construct assumes that the execution-time locale will be
+a UTF-8 one, and the generated pattern always uses Unicode rules. What
+gets matched or not thus isn't dependent on the actual runtime locale, so
+tainting is not enabled. But a C<locale> category warning is raised
+if the runtime locale turns out to not be UTF-8.
+
+=item 2
+
+Any
+L<user-defined property|perlunicode/"User-Defined Character Properties">
+used must be already defined by the time the regular expression is
+compiled (but note that this construct can be used instead of such
+properties).
+
+=item 3
+
+A regular expression that otherwise would compile
+using C<E<sol>d> rules, and which uses this construct will instead
+use C<E<sol>u>. Thus this construct tells Perl that you don't want
+C<E<sol>d> rules for the entire regular expression containing it.
+
+=back
+
+Note that skipping white space applies only to the interior of this
+construct. There must not be any space between any of the characters
+that form the initial C<(?[>. Nor may there be space between the
+closing C<])> characters.
+
+Just as in all regular expressions, the pattern can be built up by
+including variables that are interpolated at regex compilation time.
+Care must be taken to ensure that you are getting what you expect. For
+example:
+
+ my $thai_or_lao = '\p{Thai} + \p{Lao}';
+ ...
+ qr/(?[ \p{Digit} & $thai_or_lao ])/;
+
+compiles to
+
+ qr/(?[ \p{Digit} & \p{Thai} + \p{Lao} ])/;
+
+But this does not have the effect that someone reading the code would
+likely expect, as the intersection applies just to C<\p{Thai}>,
+excluding the Laotian. Pitfalls like this can be avoided by
+parenthesizing the component pieces:
+
+ my $thai_or_lao = '( \p{Thai} + \p{Lao} )';
+
+But any modifiers will still apply to all the components:
+
+ my $lower = '\p{Lower} + \p{Digit}';
+ qr/(?[ \p{Greek} & $lower ])/i;
+
+matches upper case things. You can avoid surprises by making the
+components into instances of this construct by compiling them:
+
+ my $thai_or_lao = qr/(?[ \p{Thai} + \p{Lao} ])/;
+ my $lower = qr/(?[ \p{Lower} + \p{Digit} ])/;
+
+When these are embedded in another pattern, what they match does not
+change, regardless of parenthesization or what modifiers are in effect
+in that outer pattern.
+
+Due to the way that Perl parses things, your parentheses and brackets
+may need to be balanced, even including comments. If you run into any
+examples, please send them to C<perlbug@perl.org>, so that we can have a
+concrete example for this man page.
+
+We may change it so that things that remain legal uses in normal bracketed
+character classes might become illegal within this experimental
+construct. One proposal, for example, is to forbid adjacent uses of the
+same character, as in C<(?[ [aa] ])>. The motivation for such a change
+is that this usage is likely a typo, as the second "a" adds nothing.
https://perl5.git.perl.org / perl5.git / blobdiff