I'm wondering is there a symbol for any number (including zero) of any characters
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.*
. is any char, * means repeated zero or more times.
Mat
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2Good answer, would just add see here: http://download.oracle.com/javase/1.4.2/docs/api/java/util/regex/Pattern.html – Steve Jun 22 '11 at 13:59
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16A sneaky gotcha is that `.*` does *not* match new-line character (`'\n'`). See [this question](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3651725/match-multiline-text-using-regular-expression) for more info on that topic. – Captain Man Aug 11 '15 at 19:32
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You can use this regular expression (any whitespace or any non-whitespace) as many times as possible down to and including 0.
[\s\S]*
This expression will match as few as possible, but as many as necessary for the rest of the expression.
[\s\S]*?
For example, in this regex [\s\S]*?B will match aB in aBaaaaB. But in this regex [\s\S]*B will match aBaaaaB in aBaaaaB.
agent-j
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10@linqu, `.` will sometimes not match `\n` (newline), depending on the multiline option, but `[\s\S]` will match any character. – agent-j Mar 05 '14 at 20:08
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Do you mean
.*
. any character, except newline character, with dotall mode it includes also the newline characters
* any amount of the preceding expression, including 0 times
stema
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I would use .*. . matches any character, * signifies 0 or more occurrences. You might need a DOTALL switch to the regex to capture new lines with ..
Miki
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Yes, there is one, it's the asterisk: *
a* // looks for 0 or more instances of "a"
This should be covered in any Java regex tutorial or documentation that you look up.
Cody Gray - on strike
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Loduwijk
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