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Special character | Function |
|---|---|
. | This will match any single character other than a newline |
* | This matches zero or more consecutive characters. For example (/ba*) will match “ba” and “baaa” as the expression will match more than one “a” characters. |
\ | Escape following special character. This will allow special characters to be matched within the email. For example if you are looking for “[abc]” the regex will have to be \[abc\] as this will mean that the regex will also look for “[ ]” as a character. |
( ) | Used to define a capture group within a regex. |
[ ] | This is used to define which Character sets you want to capture. For example ([a-z]) will capture all characters that are a lower case alphabetical character. |
{ } | Indicates how many characters the value must have. This can be an exact number or between a certain range. |
+ | Matches one or more consecutive characters. |
| | Matches either what is before or after the | allowing for a or condition |
In regards to the expression .*
The expression is a wildcard it’s usage should be restricted and only when completely necessary. This expression will match everything. If used incorrectly this can cause long processing times due to the expression evaluating a possibly long input which significantly delays processing in JEMH Data Center/JEMH Cloud.