OmegaMan's Musings

I am putting this here to check for broken links with WordPress. This is one of the main pages I maintain in the MSDN Forums .Net Regex Resource Reference

For those starting out with Regex’es or even those who are old hands here are some resources to help.

1. .NET Framework Developer’s Guide .NET Framework Regular Expressions
   • Regular Expression Language Elements
   • Character Classes such as. \d \s [ ] defined.
   • Quantifiers such as+ * ? { }
   • Options such asMultiline Compiled SingleLine
   • Expression Classes such as Regex Match MatchCollection GroupCollection
   • Regular Expression Examples
2. Tutorials
   • 30 Minute Regex Tutorial on CodeProject.
   • .Net Coders Regex Overview breaks down groups and matches in one of the best overviews of the topics.
   • Introduction to Regular Expressions on CodeProject.
   • Understanding Basic Regular Expression Syntax (Section 3.10.) in the CodeProject’s book chapter previewMicrosoft Visual C# .NET 2003 Developer’s Cookbook . Its a preview of Chapter 3: Strings and Regular Expressions.
   • Eric Gunnerson’s Regex 101 . A listing of differing match topics. Great for a beginner to look at after acquiring the basics of Regex, many examples.
   • How to: Search Strings Using Regular Expressions (C# Programming Guide) in MSDN Library.
3. Topics
   • General
     • Regular Expressions and the If Conditional on OmegaCoder’s blog.
     • Want faster regular expressions? Maybe you should think about that IgnoreCase option…
     • (Compilation) For an overview of the three different modes,interpreted, on-the-fly compiled and precompiled see the MSDN article CLR Inside Out , “Base Class Library Performance Tips and Tricks”
     • (Compilation To an Assembly) section 3.13. Building a Regular Expression Library in the CodeProject’s book chapter preview Microsoft Visual C# .NET 2003 Developer’s Cookbook . Its a preview of Chapter 3: Strings and Regular Expressions.
     • Regex Hangs My Expression by David Gutierrez in the BCL team blog.
     • The RegexOptions.Compiled Flag and Slow Performance on 64-Bit .NET Framework 2.0 BCL Team Blog
     • How to use RegexOptions IgnorePatternWhitspace from the Base Class Library (BCL) Team Blog.
   • Balanced Groups
     • Regex and Balanced Matching by Ryan Byington (MSFT)
     • A look into Matching Balanced Constructs with .NET Regular Expressions by Wes Haggard.
     • Fun With .NET Regex Balancing Groups
4. Programs (Not Sponsored or Endorsed by Microsoft ) Just listed; no order implied .
   • Expresso (.Net 2)(Free but registration) Used by most regex’ers; tool updated in 2007 to version 3.
   • Regular Expression Designer (.Net 1)
   • RegEx Buddy ($)
   • Regular Expression WorkBench (.Net 1.1)(Free)
   • Regular Expression Visualizer for VS2005 by Roy Osherove. Write up about it here at Visual Studio Hacks . Its a VS2005 add-in.
   • Regulator also by Osherove, which is a stand alone regex tester.
5. Web Based Regex Testers
   • NRegex Tester
   • .Net Coders Expression Tester
   • Regex Testor by RegExLib.com main site has library of regex’es for browsing.
   • Regular Expression Tester
6. Other Non Regex Tools
   • GPLEX Lexical Analyzer for when Regex comes up short and a forum post that gives an example of its usage .
7. Forums
   • RegexAdvice.com is where the core regexer’s, many different languages not just .net, give advice. Let them know you are using the .Net version.
   • Google Groups Regex Discussing Regular Expressions in variuos tools (perl, php, egrep, PowerGREP, .NET, procmail etc. etc). Let’s help each other build effective regexes!
   • ASP Message Board : Regular expressions general discussions.
8. Books
   • Regular Expressions with .NET (ebook) by Dan Appleman.
   • Mastering Regular Expressions, Third Edition by Jeffrey Friedl.
   • Sams Teach Yourself Regular Expressions in 10 Minutes by Ben Forta.
   • Regular Expression Recipes: A Problem-Solution Approach (ebook) by Nathan Good.
9. Blogs
   • Flagrant Badassery A JavaScript and regular expression centric blog
   • OmegaMan’s Musings Regex Section

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