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Python What strings does this regex matches ? (a|b)*

S

shivajikobardan

Legendary Coder
regepxal is showing infinite matches and shows "baaaaaaa" as a match. Doesn't (a|b) means a or b?
* means match 0 or more times. So, it should be matching aa,aaa,bb,bbb, , etc?
I'm not getting how baaaa is a match. Can anyone clarify please?
 
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shivajikobardan said:
regepxal is showing infinite matches and shows "baaaaaaa" as a match. Doesn't (a|b) means a or b?
* means match 0 or more times. So, it should be matching aa,aaa,bb,bbb, , etc?
I'm not getting how baaaa is a match. Can anyone clarify please?
Click to expand...
Hey there,
Did you by any chance hover over the section that says "infinite". There a convenient tooltip that pops up when you hover over it explaining what it means 🙂
 
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shivajikobardan said:
Thank you. The perfect way to think about this for me is this:

(X)*= X X X X X X

Here X=a or b
So,

a or b then a or b then a or b then....
Click to expand...
Almost! 😀.. What you really want to look into is the definitions of each special character used in a regular expression
Here's a little reference sheet for ya 😀

Regex Cheat Sheet

Regular Expressions Syntax Reference. Includes tables showing syntax, examples and matches.
www.rexegg.com www.rexegg.com
 
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