Good regex tutorial
Posted: Fri Dec 16, 2005 12:14 pm
Does anybody know where I can find a good in-depth and retard-safe regex tutorial? I have been putting off learning it for quite some time & it's about time I learn.
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The Ninja Space Goat wrote:wow... I'm sorry I never even noticed that regex section before. Thank you very much!
Hey man...I found your articles...d11wtq wrote:The Ninja Space Goat wrote:wow... I'm sorry I never even noticed that regex section before. Thank you very much!
IMHO there is no such thing. I have boundless admiration for people who understand and use regex.Does anybody know where I can find a good in-depth and retard-safe regex tutorial?
Admittedly it's something that many (good) developers stumble at. Reading tutorials alone will probably not help... you really do have to just sit down and keep writing patterns and matching them to strings. Experimentation really counts for a lot when you're learning regex.Bill H wrote:IMHO there is no such thing. I have boundless admiration for people who understand and use regex.Does anybody know where I can find a good in-depth and retard-safe regex tutorial?
I am a pretty good programmer. Good enough, at least, to have been making my living at it for many years. I program in Fortran, COBOL, Pascal, BASIC, C, C++, Assembler, SQL, VB (yecch), Visual C++, ASP, PHP and for the Web. So it is unlikely that I am dumb. I learn new things every day, so I am no towering mountain of knowledge, but I would not be where I am if I were stupid.
But when I read even the most elementary discussion of regex I turn stupid. My IQ drops to about that of a relatively successful toadstool. It's some kind of mental block, I guess. I read the first paragraph about three times and think that, while it certainly looks like English, it doesn't comprehend like English. Maybe I suddenly don't understand English, I think, but then my newspaper reads okay so it's not that.
People on this forum have been most helpful, but my ignorance seems to be invincible. It's like a suit of armor that is seemingly able to repel not only slings and arrows, but RPG's, TOW's, and 8mm howitzers.
Fortunately, I haven't come across an instance where regex was essential that I wasn't able to get somebody else to crib it for me. I will, however, never give up. I will probably insist that my wife bury me with a stinking regex tutorial.
Not true d11... what you really need is someone like you to walk you through itd11wtq wrote:Admittedly it's something that many (good) developers stumble at. Reading tutorials alone will probably not help... you really do have to just sit down and keep writing patterns and matching them to strings. Experimentation really counts for a lot when you're learning regex.
It really is one of those situations where "practise makes perfect"
ThanksBurrito wrote:Not true d11... what you really need is someone like you to walk you through itd11wtq wrote:Admittedly it's something that many (good) developers stumble at. Reading tutorials alone will probably not help... you really do have to just sit down and keep writing patterns and matching them to strings. Experimentation really counts for a lot when you're learning regex.
It really is one of those situations where "practise makes perfect"![]()
I'm by no means a regex master, but I can get by with 95% of the issues I have now thanks to the one on one help that you provided me. Maybe that's just my learning style. Or more specifically, that was the learning style required for me to understand *somewhat* regex. I"m forever grateful.
What? (He screamed.) The only part of that which I understood is "sit down." Finally some part of regex that I understand -- I do know how to sit down. Progress at last. I'm going to go in the living room where the football game is about to start and practice sitting down...sit down and keep writing patterns and matching them to strings.
TAMAVGDBill H wrote:What? (He screamed.) The only part of that which I understood is "sit down." Finally some part of regex that I understand -- I do know how to sit down. Progress at last. I'm going to go in the living room where the football game is about to start and practice sitting down.
I may eat some potato chips. I know how to do that too. In fact, I have no small expertise at it.
Burrito wrote:TAMAVGDBill H wrote:What? (He screamed.) The only part of that which I understood is "sit down." Finally some part of regex that I understand -- I do know how to sit down. Progress at last. I'm going to go in the living room where the football game is about to start and practice sitting down.
I may eat some potato chips. I know how to do that too. In fact, I have no small expertise at it.