Category: Sublime

Negative look behind with regex is another useful constraint that we can add to our expression. It only matches the right side, if and only if the look behind doesn't match. The look behind doesn’t consume any characters and has the following syntax:

(?<!<look behind>)<right side>

Example:

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<fruits>
 <a>apple</a>
 <b></b>
 <c>cashew</c>
 <d></d>
</fruits>

From the XML above find all the empty elements and add an attribute empty that is set to true but only matching the opening tag.

Negative look ahead with regex is another useful constraint that we can add to our expression. It only matches the left side, if and only if the look ahead doesn't match. The look ahead doesn't consume any characters and has the following syntax:

<left side>(?!<look ahead>)

Example:

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<fruits>
 <a>apple</a>
 <b></b>
 <c>cashew</c>
 <d></d>
</fruits>

From the XML above find all the empty elements and add an attribute empty that is set to true but only matching the opening tag.

Positive look ahead with regex is another useful constraint that we can add to our expression. It only matches the left side, if and only if the look ahead matches. The look ahead doesn't consume any characters and has the following syntax:

<left side>(?=<look ahead>)

Example:

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<fruits>
 <a>apple</a>
 <b></b>
 <c>cashew</c>
 <d></d>
</fruits>

From the XML above find all the empty elements and add an attribute empty that is set to true but only matching the opening tag.

Parentheses in regular expression (RegEx) can be used for grouping expression and can be named. To name it, after the opening parenthesis follows it with the following:

 ?<name>

Within the same expression you can backreference the group using the following:

\k<name>

On the replace field, based on the group position it will be numbered starting from 1 and increasing from the left of the expression and must be preceded with dollar sign (i.e. $). Use this number to access the captured match.

Note: if your group exceeds a single digit use ${<nn>} (e.g. ${10}) notation.

Example

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<fruits>
 <a>apple</a>
 <b></b>
 <c>cashew</c>
 <d></d>
</fruits>

From the XML above find all the empty elements and add an attribute empty that is set to true.

Parentheses in regular expression (RegEx) can be used for grouping expression.

Within the same expression you can backreference the group using the following:

\<GROUP_POSITION>

<GROUP_POSITION> is the quantitative location of the group from left to right starting from 1.

On the replace field, it follows the <GROUP_POSITION> but instead of using backslash (i.e. \) use dollar sign (i.e. $) to precedes it.

Note: if your group exceeds a single digit use ${<nn>} (e.g. ${10}) notation.

Example

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<fruits>
 <a>apple</a>
 <b></b>
 <c>cashew</c>
 <d></d>
</fruits>

From the XML above find all the empty elements and add an attribute empty that is set to true.