Regular Expressions

The course Regular Expressions gives an overview of the capabilities of Regular Expressions and the way they work.

Regular Expression Syntax
After introducing the usages of Regular Expressions and the inner operation of Regular Expression engines, the syntax of Regular Expressions is treated.
Meta Characters
Attention is paid to the various meta characters such as those for quantification and choice and the escape sequences for special characters.
Character Classes
Character classes are also discussed, including character ranges, characters to match at the beginning and end of a searched string and how to match on word boundaries. Here the difference between greedy and non-greedy Regular Expressions is addressed.
Subgroups en Backreferences
Further advanced topics like the use of subgroups and backreferences are part of the course program. In this respect it is explained how subgroup expressions are defined by parentheses and how backreferences, addressed by an index or a name, ensure repeated execution of the Regular Expression.
Substitutions
Finally it is discussed how regular expressions can be used for substitutions.