9.5 Quantifiers

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4 | Expressions and Definitions
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▼ | 9 | Regular Expressions

9.1 | Writing Regexp Patterns
9.2 | Matching Regexp Patterns
9.3 | Basic Assertions
9.4 | Characters and Character Classes
9.5 | Quantifiers
9.6 | Clusters
9.7 | Alternation
9.8 | Backtracking
9.9 | Looking Ahead and Behind
9.10 | An Extended Example

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### 9.5 Quantifiers🔗ℹ

The quantifiers *, +, and ? match respectively: zero or more, one or more, and zero or one instances of the preceding subpattern.

> > (regexp-match-positions #rx"c[ad]*r" "cadaddadddr")
> '((0 . 11))
> > (regexp-match-positions #rx"c[ad]*r" "cr")
> '((0 . 2))
> > (regexp-match-positions #rx"c[ad]+r" "cadaddadddr")
> '((0 . 11))
> > (regexp-match-positions #rx"c[ad]+r" "cr")
> #f
> > (regexp-match-positions #rx"c[ad]?r" "cadaddadddr")
> #f
> > (regexp-match-positions #rx"c[ad]?r" "cr")
> '((0 . 2))
> > (regexp-match-positions #rx"c[ad]?r" "car")
> '((0 . 3))

In #px syntax, you can use braces to specify much finer-tuned quantification than is possible with *, +, ?:

- The quantifier {m} matches exactly m instances of the preceding subpattern; m must be a nonnegative integer.

- The quantifier {m,n} matches at least m and at most n instances. m and n are nonnegative integers with m less or equal to n. You may omit either or both numbers, in which case m defaults to 0 and n to infinity.

It is evident that + and ? are abbreviations for {1,} and {0,1} respectively, and * abbreviates {,}, which is the same as {0,}.

> > (regexp-match #px"[aeiou]{3}" "vacuous")
> '("uou")
> > (regexp-match #px"[aeiou]{3}" "evolve")
> #f
> > (regexp-match #px"[aeiou]{2,3}" "evolve")
> #f
> > (regexp-match #px"[aeiou]{2,3}" "zeugma")
> '("eu")

The quantifiers described so far are all greedy: they match the maximal number of instances that would still lead to an overall match for the full pattern.

> > (regexp-match #rx"<.*>" "<tag1> <tag2> <tag3>")
> '("<tag1> <tag2> <tag3>")

To make these quantifiers non-greedy, append a ? to them. Non-greedy quantifiers match the minimal number of instances needed to ensure an overall match.

> > (regexp-match #rx"<.*?>" "<tag1> <tag2> <tag3>")
> '("<tag1>")

The non-greedy quantifiers are *?, +?, ??, {m}?, and {m,n}?, although {m}? is always the same as {m}. Note that the metacharacter ? has two different uses, and both uses are represented in ??.

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