Details of Regular Expression Behavior

The following sections detail the specific behavior you can expect from .NET Framework regular expressions.

In This Section

• Matching Behavior
  Provides information about the .NET Framework regular expression engine matching behavior.
• Backreferences
  Provides information about how regular expression backreferencing is used to find repeating groups of characters.
• Backtracking
  Provides information about how regular expression backtracking branches to find alternative matches.
• Nonbacktracking Lookahead and Lookbehind
  Provides information about regular expression lookahead and lookbehind behavior.
• Quantifiers and Empty Matches
  Explains how you can specify the minimum and maximum desired number of matches and how the regular expression engine handles empty matches.
• Next Match After an Empty Match
  Explains how the regular expression engine advances through a string after empty matches.
• Compilation and Reuse
  Provides information about compiling and reusing regular expressions to increase performance.
• Thread Safety
  Provides information on regular expression thread safety and when you should synchronize access to regular expression objects.

Related Sections

• Regular Expressions as a Language
  Provides an overview of the programming-language aspect of regular expressions.
• Regular Expression Classes
  Provides information and code examples illustrating how to use the regular expression classes.
• Regular Expression Examples
  Contains code examples that illustrate the use of regular expressions in common applications.
• Regular Expression Language Elements
  Provides information on the set of characters, operators, and constructs that you can use to define regular expressions.
• System.Text.RegularExpressions
  Provides class-library reference information for the .NET Framework System.Text.RegularExpressions namespace