Message from Dean - May 8th 2007
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Regular Expression Pocket Reference: Regular Expressions for Perl, Ruby, PHP, Python, C, Java and .NET (Pocket Reference (O'Reilly))
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Books : Regular Expression Pocket Reference: Regular Expressions for Perl, Ruby, PHP, Python, C, Java and .NET (Pocket Reference (O'Reilly))
Rating:  -
This is not a learning text by any stretch of the imagination. Covering the basic implementation of Regular Expressions in Perl, Java, .NET, C#, Python, PCRE, PHP, vi Editor, JavaScript, and a few shell utilities, this title is well suited as a quick "cheat sheet" for those already familiar, often providing the required information in just the "Supported Metacharacters" section.
Although around 90 (small) pages, the book repeats the same 8-page sequence for each of the aforementioned languages, tweaked as needed. Although handy for those that regularly use multiple languages, the book's format could have been made more efficient.
Those looking for just an as-needed reminder, this title meets your needs. For those looking to learn Regular Expressions, Mastering Regular Expressions (3rd Edition) by Jeffrey Friedl (ISBN: 0596528124) is where you should start.
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This is a great handy reference to compare several popular tools supporting regrex.
While I found it may have an error. In page-70, say "Both(vi and vim) use a DFA match engine.", while in another book "Computer Science and Perl Programming" page-91, the author of "Mastering Regular Expressing" Jeffrey Friedl said "Perl has always used an NFA engine, as does vi, sed, GNU emacs, Python, Tcl, expect, and most version of grep". I knew these two engine are very much different, and vim regrex does support capturing and backreference(NFA engine). So I guess there's something wrong in this reference. Could the author check up this issue please? thanks.
Rating:  -
One of the most difficult things when working with regular expressoins -- at least for me -- is dealing with different implementations (i.e., Perl, Java, Python, PHP, UNIX tools, etc.) The basics of regexes and pattern matching don't vary all that much, but each implementation is just different enough that the smae line of code can yield different results. If you work with more than one of these implementations, keeping track of differences in metacharacters and metasequences can be nearly impossible. This is especially true when -- as is the case with me -- you deal with regexes somewhat intermittently.
This is one of the main reasons why the "Regular Expression Pocket Reference"
was written and this is why I keep it close at hand. This book will not really teach you how to use regexes, nor will it tell you how to use, say, Perl. If, however, you use Perl and you know how to use regexes but just can't remember whether you can disallow backtracking for text matched by a subpattern, then this book will save you quite a bit of time and effort.
If you're wondering what it means to "disallow backtracking for text matched by a subpattern," or when you would want to use it, buy "Mastering Regular Expressions" or a similar title. The "Regular Expression Pocket Reference" is designed to be a quick reference tool, and it serves this purpose very well. I would recommend it especially for those who work with regular expressions intermittently or who work with several different implementations.
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This is an ideal pcoket reference for people who need to lookup the details of regular expression syntax. This is not for people who know nothing about regular expressions.
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It's nearly impossible to memorize all the minutiae of regular expressions, especially over multiple language implementations. Tony Stubblebine's book Regular Expression Pocket Reference by O'Reilly is a nice way to help you out without digging through endless pages.
Chapter List: About This Book; Introduction To Regexes And Pattern Matching; Perl 5.8; Java (java.util.regex); .NET And C#; Python; PCRE Lib; PHP; vi Editor; JavaScript; Shell Tools; Index
Like most pocket references, this book is small (93 pages), but there's a lot of information packed into a small space. Each implementation chapter covers the metacharacters and metasequences that are supported in the language's implementation of regular expressions. This is followed by the language functions, examples of regular expressions, and a list of additional resources the reader can use to learn more about regular expressions in that language. If you don't know anything about the subject, this book (in my opinion) isn't going to help you out much. It assumes that you already understand the material and you're looking for a reference guide to find quick answers. And that's fine. This book has a definite purpose and target audience, and I think it does a very nice job of hitting the mark.
For me, this would be a perfect companion book to Mastering Regular Expressions (also by O'Reilly). Mastering is considered one of the definitive volumes on the subject, and having this pocket guide on hand to jog your memory on lesser-used points would be perfect.
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