JDK 1.4 Tutorial, eDoc 6 : Understanding and Using Regular Expressions in Java

Since the rise of Perl, every computer language suffers from Regular Expression-envy. Well, no more -- JDK 1.4 now comes with a full-featured regex implementation.

This e-doc starts out with a detailed exposition on regular expressions -- what they are, what they are useful for, and how they are implemented within Java. Then, four simple examples are implemented -- first in Perl, and then, identically, in Java. Finally, two more substantial programs, in Java only, round out the tutorial.

This e-doc will show you how to:

• Understand regular expressions
• Match strings and substrings against a pattern
• Pull matched components out of strings

Sample programs included in this chapter: (In both Perl and Java)

• Find the longest word in a line of text
• Parse a tab-delimited file
• A simple command-line interpreter
• Parsing and inspecting proper names

Other sample program included in this chapter: (Java only)

• A simple HTML templating system
• A data-driven lexical analyzer