A pattern (or a mask) is used for matching a given string of characters for "find" or "find and replace" operations, where some parts of the string are masked by wildcards. During run-time, these wildcard characters are evaluated to match the characters in the actual string.
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Symbol | Description | Example | Matching Entries |
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| The question mark indicates zero or one occurrences occurrence of the preceding element. |
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| The asterisk indicates zero or more occurrences of the preceding element. |
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| The plus sign indicates one or more occurrences of the preceding element. |
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| The preceding item is matched exactly n times. |
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| The preceding item is matched min or more times. |
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| The preceding item is matched at least min times, but not more than max times. |
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| The period matches any single character. |
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| Represents a numeric character. |
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| Represents a non-numeric character. |
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| Represents an OR selector between several strings. |
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| Parentheses are used to define the scope and precedence of the operators. |
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| Represents any single character within the brackets |
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| Matches every character except the ones inside brackets. |
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