Powershell - Regular Expression

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A regular expression is a special sequence of characters that helps you match or find other strings or sets of strings, using a specialized syntax held in a pattern. They can be used to search, edit, or manipulate text and data.

Here is the table listing down all the regular expression metacharacter syntax available in PowerShell −

Subexpression Matches
^ Matches the beginning of the line.
$ Matches the end of the line.
. Matches any single character except newline. Using m option allows it to match the newline as well.
[...] Matches any single character in brackets.
[^...] Matches any single character not in brackets.
\A Beginning of the entire string.
\z End of the entire string.
\Z End of the entire string except allowable final line terminator.
re* Matches 0 or more occurrences of the preceding expression.
re+ Matches 1 or more of the previous thing.
re? Matches 0 or 1 occurrence of the preceding expression.
re{ n} Matches exactly n number of occurrences of the preceding expression.
re{ n,} Matches n or more occurrences of the preceding expression.
re{ n, m} Matches at least n and at most m occurrences of the preceding expression.
a| b Matches either a or b.
(re) Groups regular expressions and remembers the matched text.
(?: re) Groups regular expressions without remembering the matched text.
(?> re) Matches the independent pattern without backtracking.
\w Matches the word characters.
\W Matches the nonword characters.
\s Matches the whitespace. Equivalent to [\t\n\r\f].
\S Matches the nonwhitespace.
\d Matches the digits. Equivalent to [0-9].
\D Matches the nondigits.
\A Matches the beginning of the string.
\Z Matches the end of the string. If a newline exists, it matches just before newline.
\z Matches the end of the string.
\G Matches the point where the last match finished.
\n Back-reference to capture group number "n".
\b Matches the word boundaries when outside the brackets. Matches the backspace (0x08) when inside the brackets.
\B Matches the nonword boundaries.
\n, \t, etc. Matches newlines, carriage returns, tabs, etc.
\Q Escape (quote) all characters up to \E.
\E Ends quoting begun with \Q.

Here is a complete examples showing how to use regex in PowerShell;

Sr.No. Match & Description
1 Match Characters

Example of supported regular expression characters.
2 Match Character Classes

Example of supported character classes.
3 Match Quantifiers

Example of supported quantifiers.
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