Regular Expressions

[Flipez]

Proposed API:

// Regex literals
pattern = /\d{3}-\d{4}/

// Match operations
phone = "555-1234"
phone.match(/\d{3}-\d{4}/)  // Returns match object or nil
phone.match?(/\d{3}/)       // Returns boolean

// Replace with patterns
text = "Hello 123 World 456"
text.gsub(/\d+/, "X")       // "Hello X World X"
text.sub(/\d+/, "X")        // "Hello X World 456" (first only)

// Split with patterns
"a1b2c3".split(/\d/)        // ["a", "b", "c"]

// Scan for all matches
"abc 123 def 456".scan(/\d+/)  // ["123", "456"]

// Capture groups
match = "2024-01-17".match(/(\d{4})-(\d{2})-(\d{2})/)
match[1]  // "2024"
match[2]  // "01"
match[3]  // "17"

// Match operator
if phone =~ /\d{3}-\d{4}/
  puts("Valid phone")
end