CODEWITHSUNDEEP
regex
Moksha
Moksha

Reputation: 1030

Regex : Find a number between space

I am trying to extract a zip code of six numbers starting with the number 4 from a string. Right now I am using [4][0-9]{5}, but it is also matching starting from other numbers, like 020-25468811 and it's returning 468811. I don't want it to search in the middle of a number, only full numbers.

Upvotes: 2

Views: 1451

Answers (4)

Ulugbek Umirov
Ulugbek Umirov

Reputation: 12807

Try to use the following:

(?<!\d)4\d{5}(?!\d)

I.e. find 6-digit number starting with 4 and not preceded or followed by digit.

Upvotes: 2

This
This

Reputation: 45

Your expression right now tries to match any six numbers consisting of a 4 with five numbers between 0 and 9. To fix this behavior you should add word boundaries as per Jon's suggestion.

\b[4][0-9]{5}\b

More on word boundaries here: http://www.regular-expressions.info/wordboundaries.html

Upvotes: 1

davir
davir

Reputation: 942

There is a start of line character in regex: ^

You could do:

^4[0-9]{5}

If the numbers are not always in the beginning of a line, you can more generally use:

\<4[0-9]{5}\>

To match only whole words. Both examples work with egrep.

Upvotes: -1

SebastianH
SebastianH

Reputation: 2182

You could simply add a space to the beginning of your regular expression " 4[0-9]{5}". If you need a more universal way of finding the beginning of the number (could it maybe be also be tabulator, a newline, etc?) you should have look at the predefined character class \s. Also have a look at boundary matchers. I dont know which language you are using, but regex work very similar in most languages. Check this Java regex documentation.

Upvotes: 0

Related Questions