1<html> 2<head> 3<title>pcre2syntax specification</title> 4</head> 5<body bgcolor="#FFFFFF" text="#00005A" link="#0066FF" alink="#3399FF" vlink="#2222BB"> 6<h1>pcre2syntax man page</h1> 7<p> 8Return to the <a href="index.html">PCRE2 index page</a>. 9</p> 10<p> 11This page is part of the PCRE2 HTML documentation. It was generated 12automatically from the original man page. If there is any nonsense in it, 13please consult the man page, in case the conversion went wrong. 14<br> 15<ul> 16<li><a name="TOC1" href="#SEC1">PCRE2 REGULAR EXPRESSION SYNTAX SUMMARY</a> 17<li><a name="TOC2" href="#SEC2">QUOTING</a> 18<li><a name="TOC3" href="#SEC3">ESCAPED CHARACTERS</a> 19<li><a name="TOC4" href="#SEC4">CHARACTER TYPES</a> 20<li><a name="TOC5" href="#SEC5">GENERAL CATEGORY PROPERTIES FOR \p and \P</a> 21<li><a name="TOC6" href="#SEC6">PCRE2 SPECIAL CATEGORY PROPERTIES FOR \p and \P</a> 22<li><a name="TOC7" href="#SEC7">SCRIPT NAMES FOR \p AND \P</a> 23<li><a name="TOC8" href="#SEC8">CHARACTER CLASSES</a> 24<li><a name="TOC9" href="#SEC9">QUANTIFIERS</a> 25<li><a name="TOC10" href="#SEC10">ANCHORS AND SIMPLE ASSERTIONS</a> 26<li><a name="TOC11" href="#SEC11">REPORTED MATCH POINT SETTING</a> 27<li><a name="TOC12" href="#SEC12">ALTERNATION</a> 28<li><a name="TOC13" href="#SEC13">CAPTURING</a> 29<li><a name="TOC14" href="#SEC14">ATOMIC GROUPS</a> 30<li><a name="TOC15" href="#SEC15">COMMENT</a> 31<li><a name="TOC16" href="#SEC16">OPTION SETTING</a> 32<li><a name="TOC17" href="#SEC17">NEWLINE CONVENTION</a> 33<li><a name="TOC18" href="#SEC18">WHAT \R MATCHES</a> 34<li><a name="TOC19" href="#SEC19">LOOKAHEAD AND LOOKBEHIND ASSERTIONS</a> 35<li><a name="TOC20" href="#SEC20">NON-ATOMIC LOOKAROUND ASSERTIONS</a> 36<li><a name="TOC21" href="#SEC21">SCRIPT RUNS</a> 37<li><a name="TOC22" href="#SEC22">BACKREFERENCES</a> 38<li><a name="TOC23" href="#SEC23">SUBROUTINE REFERENCES (POSSIBLY RECURSIVE)</a> 39<li><a name="TOC24" href="#SEC24">CONDITIONAL PATTERNS</a> 40<li><a name="TOC25" href="#SEC25">BACKTRACKING CONTROL</a> 41<li><a name="TOC26" href="#SEC26">CALLOUTS</a> 42<li><a name="TOC27" href="#SEC27">SEE ALSO</a> 43<li><a name="TOC28" href="#SEC28">AUTHOR</a> 44<li><a name="TOC29" href="#SEC29">REVISION</a> 45</ul> 46<br><a name="SEC1" href="#TOC1">PCRE2 REGULAR EXPRESSION SYNTAX SUMMARY</a><br> 47<P> 48The full syntax and semantics of the regular expressions that are supported by 49PCRE2 are described in the 50<a href="pcre2pattern.html"><b>pcre2pattern</b></a> 51documentation. This document contains a quick-reference summary of the syntax. 52</P> 53<br><a name="SEC2" href="#TOC1">QUOTING</a><br> 54<P> 55<pre> 56 \x where x is non-alphanumeric is a literal x 57 \Q...\E treat enclosed characters as literal 58</PRE> 59</P> 60<br><a name="SEC3" href="#TOC1">ESCAPED CHARACTERS</a><br> 61<P> 62This table applies to ASCII and Unicode environments. An unrecognized escape 63sequence causes an error. 64<pre> 65 \a alarm, that is, the BEL character (hex 07) 66 \cx "control-x", where x is any ASCII printing character 67 \e escape (hex 1B) 68 \f form feed (hex 0C) 69 \n newline (hex 0A) 70 \r carriage return (hex 0D) 71 \t tab (hex 09) 72 \0dd character with octal code 0dd 73 \ddd character with octal code ddd, or backreference 74 \o{ddd..} character with octal code ddd.. 75 \N{U+hh..} character with Unicode code point hh.. (Unicode mode only) 76 \xhh character with hex code hh 77 \x{hh..} character with hex code hh.. 78</pre> 79If PCRE2_ALT_BSUX or PCRE2_EXTRA_ALT_BSUX is set ("ALT_BSUX mode"), the 80following are also recognized: 81<pre> 82 \U the character "U" 83 \uhhhh character with hex code hhhh 84 \u{hh..} character with hex code hh.. but only for EXTRA_ALT_BSUX 85</pre> 86When \x is not followed by {, from zero to two hexadecimal digits are read, 87but in ALT_BSUX mode \x must be followed by two hexadecimal digits to be 88recognized as a hexadecimal escape; otherwise it matches a literal "x". 89Likewise, if \u (in ALT_BSUX mode) is not followed by four hexadecimal digits 90or (in EXTRA_ALT_BSUX mode) a sequence of hex digits in curly brackets, it 91matches a literal "u". 92</P> 93<P> 94Note that \0dd is always an octal code. The treatment of backslash followed by 95a non-zero digit is complicated; for details see the section 96<a href="pcre2pattern.html#digitsafterbackslash">"Non-printing characters"</a> 97in the 98<a href="pcre2pattern.html"><b>pcre2pattern</b></a> 99documentation, where details of escape processing in EBCDIC environments are 100also given. \N{U+hh..} is synonymous with \x{hh..} in PCRE2 but is not 101supported in EBCDIC environments. Note that \N not followed by an opening 102curly bracket has a different meaning (see below). 103</P> 104<br><a name="SEC4" href="#TOC1">CHARACTER TYPES</a><br> 105<P> 106<pre> 107 . any character except newline; 108 in dotall mode, any character whatsoever 109 \C one code unit, even in UTF mode (best avoided) 110 \d a decimal digit 111 \D a character that is not a decimal digit 112 \h a horizontal white space character 113 \H a character that is not a horizontal white space character 114 \N a character that is not a newline 115 \p{<i>xx</i>} a character with the <i>xx</i> property 116 \P{<i>xx</i>} a character without the <i>xx</i> property 117 \R a newline sequence 118 \s a white space character 119 \S a character that is not a white space character 120 \v a vertical white space character 121 \V a character that is not a vertical white space character 122 \w a "word" character 123 \W a "non-word" character 124 \X a Unicode extended grapheme cluster 125</pre> 126\C is dangerous because it may leave the current matching point in the middle 127of a UTF-8 or UTF-16 character. The application can lock out the use of \C by 128setting the PCRE2_NEVER_BACKSLASH_C option. It is also possible to build PCRE2 129with the use of \C permanently disabled. 130</P> 131<P> 132By default, \d, \s, and \w match only ASCII characters, even in UTF-8 mode 133or in the 16-bit and 32-bit libraries. However, if locale-specific matching is 134happening, \s and \w may also match characters with code points in the range 135128-255. If the PCRE2_UCP option is set, the behaviour of these escape 136sequences is changed to use Unicode properties and they match many more 137characters. 138</P> 139<br><a name="SEC5" href="#TOC1">GENERAL CATEGORY PROPERTIES FOR \p and \P</a><br> 140<P> 141<pre> 142 C Other 143 Cc Control 144 Cf Format 145 Cn Unassigned 146 Co Private use 147 Cs Surrogate 148 149 L Letter 150 Ll Lower case letter 151 Lm Modifier letter 152 Lo Other letter 153 Lt Title case letter 154 Lu Upper case letter 155 L& Ll, Lu, or Lt 156 157 M Mark 158 Mc Spacing mark 159 Me Enclosing mark 160 Mn Non-spacing mark 161 162 N Number 163 Nd Decimal number 164 Nl Letter number 165 No Other number 166 167 P Punctuation 168 Pc Connector punctuation 169 Pd Dash punctuation 170 Pe Close punctuation 171 Pf Final punctuation 172 Pi Initial punctuation 173 Po Other punctuation 174 Ps Open punctuation 175 176 S Symbol 177 Sc Currency symbol 178 Sk Modifier symbol 179 Sm Mathematical symbol 180 So Other symbol 181 182 Z Separator 183 Zl Line separator 184 Zp Paragraph separator 185 Zs Space separator 186</PRE> 187</P> 188<br><a name="SEC6" href="#TOC1">PCRE2 SPECIAL CATEGORY PROPERTIES FOR \p and \P</a><br> 189<P> 190<pre> 191 Xan Alphanumeric: union of properties L and N 192 Xps POSIX space: property Z or tab, NL, VT, FF, CR 193 Xsp Perl space: property Z or tab, NL, VT, FF, CR 194 Xuc Univerally-named character: one that can be 195 represented by a Universal Character Name 196 Xwd Perl word: property Xan or underscore 197</pre> 198Perl and POSIX space are now the same. Perl added VT to its space character set 199at release 5.18. 200</P> 201<br><a name="SEC7" href="#TOC1">SCRIPT NAMES FOR \p AND \P</a><br> 202<P> 203Adlam, 204Ahom, 205Anatolian_Hieroglyphs, 206Arabic, 207Armenian, 208Avestan, 209Balinese, 210Bamum, 211Bassa_Vah, 212Batak, 213Bengali, 214Bhaiksuki, 215Bopomofo, 216Brahmi, 217Braille, 218Buginese, 219Buhid, 220Canadian_Aboriginal, 221Carian, 222Caucasian_Albanian, 223Chakma, 224Cham, 225Cherokee, 226Chorasmian, 227Common, 228Coptic, 229Cuneiform, 230Cypriot, 231Cyrillic, 232Deseret, 233Devanagari, 234Dives_Akuru, 235Dogra, 236Duployan, 237Egyptian_Hieroglyphs, 238Elbasan, 239Elymaic, 240Ethiopic, 241Georgian, 242Glagolitic, 243Gothic, 244Grantha, 245Greek, 246Gujarati, 247Gunjala_Gondi, 248Gurmukhi, 249Han, 250Hangul, 251Hanifi_Rohingya, 252Hanunoo, 253Hatran, 254Hebrew, 255Hiragana, 256Imperial_Aramaic, 257Inherited, 258Inscriptional_Pahlavi, 259Inscriptional_Parthian, 260Javanese, 261Kaithi, 262Kannada, 263Katakana, 264Kayah_Li, 265Kharoshthi, 266Khitan_Small_Script, 267Khmer, 268Khojki, 269Khudawadi, 270Lao, 271Latin, 272Lepcha, 273Limbu, 274Linear_A, 275Linear_B, 276Lisu, 277Lycian, 278Lydian, 279Mahajani, 280Makasar, 281Malayalam, 282Mandaic, 283Manichaean, 284Marchen, 285Masaram_Gondi, 286Medefaidrin, 287Meetei_Mayek, 288Mende_Kikakui, 289Meroitic_Cursive, 290Meroitic_Hieroglyphs, 291Miao, 292Modi, 293Mongolian, 294Mro, 295Multani, 296Myanmar, 297Nabataean, 298Nandinagari, 299New_Tai_Lue, 300Newa, 301Nko, 302Nushu, 303Nyakeng_Puachue_Hmong, 304Ogham, 305Ol_Chiki, 306Old_Hungarian, 307Old_Italic, 308Old_North_Arabian, 309Old_Permic, 310Old_Persian, 311Old_Sogdian, 312Old_South_Arabian, 313Old_Turkic, 314Oriya, 315Osage, 316Osmanya, 317Pahawh_Hmong, 318Palmyrene, 319Pau_Cin_Hau, 320Phags_Pa, 321Phoenician, 322Psalter_Pahlavi, 323Rejang, 324Runic, 325Samaritan, 326Saurashtra, 327Sharada, 328Shavian, 329Siddham, 330SignWriting, 331Sinhala, 332Sogdian, 333Sora_Sompeng, 334Soyombo, 335Sundanese, 336Syloti_Nagri, 337Syriac, 338Tagalog, 339Tagbanwa, 340Tai_Le, 341Tai_Tham, 342Tai_Viet, 343Takri, 344Tamil, 345Tangut, 346Telugu, 347Thaana, 348Thai, 349Tibetan, 350Tifinagh, 351Tirhuta, 352Ugaritic, 353Vai, 354Wancho, 355Warang_Citi, 356Yezidi, 357Yi, 358Zanabazar_Square. 359</P> 360<br><a name="SEC8" href="#TOC1">CHARACTER CLASSES</a><br> 361<P> 362<pre> 363 [...] positive character class 364 [^...] negative character class 365 [x-y] range (can be used for hex characters) 366 [[:xxx:]] positive POSIX named set 367 [[:^xxx:]] negative POSIX named set 368 369 alnum alphanumeric 370 alpha alphabetic 371 ascii 0-127 372 blank space or tab 373 cntrl control character 374 digit decimal digit 375 graph printing, excluding space 376 lower lower case letter 377 print printing, including space 378 punct printing, excluding alphanumeric 379 space white space 380 upper upper case letter 381 word same as \w 382 xdigit hexadecimal digit 383</pre> 384In PCRE2, POSIX character set names recognize only ASCII characters by default, 385but some of them use Unicode properties if PCRE2_UCP is set. You can use 386\Q...\E inside a character class. 387</P> 388<br><a name="SEC9" href="#TOC1">QUANTIFIERS</a><br> 389<P> 390<pre> 391 ? 0 or 1, greedy 392 ?+ 0 or 1, possessive 393 ?? 0 or 1, lazy 394 * 0 or more, greedy 395 *+ 0 or more, possessive 396 *? 0 or more, lazy 397 + 1 or more, greedy 398 ++ 1 or more, possessive 399 +? 1 or more, lazy 400 {n} exactly n 401 {n,m} at least n, no more than m, greedy 402 {n,m}+ at least n, no more than m, possessive 403 {n,m}? at least n, no more than m, lazy 404 {n,} n or more, greedy 405 {n,}+ n or more, possessive 406 {n,}? n or more, lazy 407</PRE> 408</P> 409<br><a name="SEC10" href="#TOC1">ANCHORS AND SIMPLE ASSERTIONS</a><br> 410<P> 411<pre> 412 \b word boundary 413 \B not a word boundary 414 ^ start of subject 415 also after an internal newline in multiline mode 416 (after any newline if PCRE2_ALT_CIRCUMFLEX is set) 417 \A start of subject 418 $ end of subject 419 also before newline at end of subject 420 also before internal newline in multiline mode 421 \Z end of subject 422 also before newline at end of subject 423 \z end of subject 424 \G first matching position in subject 425</PRE> 426</P> 427<br><a name="SEC11" href="#TOC1">REPORTED MATCH POINT SETTING</a><br> 428<P> 429<pre> 430 \K set reported start of match 431</pre> 432\K is honoured in positive assertions, but ignored in negative ones. 433</P> 434<br><a name="SEC12" href="#TOC1">ALTERNATION</a><br> 435<P> 436<pre> 437 expr|expr|expr... 438</PRE> 439</P> 440<br><a name="SEC13" href="#TOC1">CAPTURING</a><br> 441<P> 442<pre> 443 (...) capture group 444 (?<name>...) named capture group (Perl) 445 (?'name'...) named capture group (Perl) 446 (?P<name>...) named capture group (Python) 447 (?:...) non-capture group 448 (?|...) non-capture group; reset group numbers for 449 capture groups in each alternative 450</pre> 451In non-UTF modes, names may contain underscores and ASCII letters and digits; 452in UTF modes, any Unicode letters and Unicode decimal digits are permitted. In 453both cases, a name must not start with a digit. 454</P> 455<br><a name="SEC14" href="#TOC1">ATOMIC GROUPS</a><br> 456<P> 457<pre> 458 (?>...) atomic non-capture group 459 (*atomic:...) atomic non-capture group 460</PRE> 461</P> 462<br><a name="SEC15" href="#TOC1">COMMENT</a><br> 463<P> 464<pre> 465 (?#....) comment (not nestable) 466</PRE> 467</P> 468<br><a name="SEC16" href="#TOC1">OPTION SETTING</a><br> 469<P> 470Changes of these options within a group are automatically cancelled at the end 471of the group. 472<pre> 473 (?i) caseless 474 (?J) allow duplicate named groups 475 (?m) multiline 476 (?n) no auto capture 477 (?s) single line (dotall) 478 (?U) default ungreedy (lazy) 479 (?x) extended: ignore white space except in classes 480 (?xx) as (?x) but also ignore space and tab in classes 481 (?-...) unset option(s) 482 (?^) unset imnsx options 483</pre> 484Unsetting x or xx unsets both. Several options may be set at once, and a 485mixture of setting and unsetting such as (?i-x) is allowed, but there may be 486only one hyphen. Setting (but no unsetting) is allowed after (?^ for example 487(?^in). An option setting may appear at the start of a non-capture group, for 488example (?i:...). 489</P> 490<P> 491The following are recognized only at the very start of a pattern or after one 492of the newline or \R options with similar syntax. More than one of them may 493appear. For the first three, d is a decimal number. 494<pre> 495 (*LIMIT_DEPTH=d) set the backtracking limit to d 496 (*LIMIT_HEAP=d) set the heap size limit to d * 1024 bytes 497 (*LIMIT_MATCH=d) set the match limit to d 498 (*NOTEMPTY) set PCRE2_NOTEMPTY when matching 499 (*NOTEMPTY_ATSTART) set PCRE2_NOTEMPTY_ATSTART when matching 500 (*NO_AUTO_POSSESS) no auto-possessification (PCRE2_NO_AUTO_POSSESS) 501 (*NO_DOTSTAR_ANCHOR) no .* anchoring (PCRE2_NO_DOTSTAR_ANCHOR) 502 (*NO_JIT) disable JIT optimization 503 (*NO_START_OPT) no start-match optimization (PCRE2_NO_START_OPTIMIZE) 504 (*UTF) set appropriate UTF mode for the library in use 505 (*UCP) set PCRE2_UCP (use Unicode properties for \d etc) 506</pre> 507Note that LIMIT_DEPTH, LIMIT_HEAP, and LIMIT_MATCH can only reduce the value of 508the limits set by the caller of <b>pcre2_match()</b> or <b>pcre2_dfa_match()</b>, 509not increase them. LIMIT_RECURSION is an obsolete synonym for LIMIT_DEPTH. The 510application can lock out the use of (*UTF) and (*UCP) by setting the 511PCRE2_NEVER_UTF or PCRE2_NEVER_UCP options, respectively, at compile time. 512</P> 513<br><a name="SEC17" href="#TOC1">NEWLINE CONVENTION</a><br> 514<P> 515These are recognized only at the very start of the pattern or after option 516settings with a similar syntax. 517<pre> 518 (*CR) carriage return only 519 (*LF) linefeed only 520 (*CRLF) carriage return followed by linefeed 521 (*ANYCRLF) all three of the above 522 (*ANY) any Unicode newline sequence 523 (*NUL) the NUL character (binary zero) 524</PRE> 525</P> 526<br><a name="SEC18" href="#TOC1">WHAT \R MATCHES</a><br> 527<P> 528These are recognized only at the very start of the pattern or after option 529setting with a similar syntax. 530<pre> 531 (*BSR_ANYCRLF) CR, LF, or CRLF 532 (*BSR_UNICODE) any Unicode newline sequence 533</PRE> 534</P> 535<br><a name="SEC19" href="#TOC1">LOOKAHEAD AND LOOKBEHIND ASSERTIONS</a><br> 536<P> 537<pre> 538 (?=...) ) 539 (*pla:...) ) positive lookahead 540 (*positive_lookahead:...) ) 541 542 (?!...) ) 543 (*nla:...) ) negative lookahead 544 (*negative_lookahead:...) ) 545 546 (?<=...) ) 547 (*plb:...) ) positive lookbehind 548 (*positive_lookbehind:...) ) 549 550 (?<!...) ) 551 (*nlb:...) ) negative lookbehind 552 (*negative_lookbehind:...) ) 553</pre> 554Each top-level branch of a lookbehind must be of a fixed length. 555</P> 556<br><a name="SEC20" href="#TOC1">NON-ATOMIC LOOKAROUND ASSERTIONS</a><br> 557<P> 558These assertions are specific to PCRE2 and are not Perl-compatible. 559<pre> 560 (?*...) ) 561 (*napla:...) ) synonyms 562 (*non_atomic_positive_lookahead:...) ) 563 564 (?<*...) ) 565 (*naplb:...) ) synonyms 566 (*non_atomic_positive_lookbehind:...) ) 567</PRE> 568</P> 569<br><a name="SEC21" href="#TOC1">SCRIPT RUNS</a><br> 570<P> 571<pre> 572 (*script_run:...) ) script run, can be backtracked into 573 (*sr:...) ) 574 575 (*atomic_script_run:...) ) atomic script run 576 (*asr:...) ) 577</PRE> 578</P> 579<br><a name="SEC22" href="#TOC1">BACKREFERENCES</a><br> 580<P> 581<pre> 582 \n reference by number (can be ambiguous) 583 \gn reference by number 584 \g{n} reference by number 585 \g+n relative reference by number (PCRE2 extension) 586 \g-n relative reference by number 587 \g{+n} relative reference by number (PCRE2 extension) 588 \g{-n} relative reference by number 589 \k<name> reference by name (Perl) 590 \k'name' reference by name (Perl) 591 \g{name} reference by name (Perl) 592 \k{name} reference by name (.NET) 593 (?P=name) reference by name (Python) 594</PRE> 595</P> 596<br><a name="SEC23" href="#TOC1">SUBROUTINE REFERENCES (POSSIBLY RECURSIVE)</a><br> 597<P> 598<pre> 599 (?R) recurse whole pattern 600 (?n) call subroutine by absolute number 601 (?+n) call subroutine by relative number 602 (?-n) call subroutine by relative number 603 (?&name) call subroutine by name (Perl) 604 (?P>name) call subroutine by name (Python) 605 \g<name> call subroutine by name (Oniguruma) 606 \g'name' call subroutine by name (Oniguruma) 607 \g<n> call subroutine by absolute number (Oniguruma) 608 \g'n' call subroutine by absolute number (Oniguruma) 609 \g<+n> call subroutine by relative number (PCRE2 extension) 610 \g'+n' call subroutine by relative number (PCRE2 extension) 611 \g<-n> call subroutine by relative number (PCRE2 extension) 612 \g'-n' call subroutine by relative number (PCRE2 extension) 613</PRE> 614</P> 615<br><a name="SEC24" href="#TOC1">CONDITIONAL PATTERNS</a><br> 616<P> 617<pre> 618 (?(condition)yes-pattern) 619 (?(condition)yes-pattern|no-pattern) 620 621 (?(n) absolute reference condition 622 (?(+n) relative reference condition 623 (?(-n) relative reference condition 624 (?(<name>) named reference condition (Perl) 625 (?('name') named reference condition (Perl) 626 (?(name) named reference condition (PCRE2, deprecated) 627 (?(R) overall recursion condition 628 (?(Rn) specific numbered group recursion condition 629 (?(R&name) specific named group recursion condition 630 (?(DEFINE) define groups for reference 631 (?(VERSION[>]=n.m) test PCRE2 version 632 (?(assert) assertion condition 633</pre> 634Note the ambiguity of (?(R) and (?(Rn) which might be named reference 635conditions or recursion tests. Such a condition is interpreted as a reference 636condition if the relevant named group exists. 637</P> 638<br><a name="SEC25" href="#TOC1">BACKTRACKING CONTROL</a><br> 639<P> 640All backtracking control verbs may be in the form (*VERB:NAME). For (*MARK) the 641name is mandatory, for the others it is optional. (*SKIP) changes its behaviour 642if :NAME is present. The others just set a name for passing back to the caller, 643but this is not a name that (*SKIP) can see. The following act immediately they 644are reached: 645<pre> 646 (*ACCEPT) force successful match 647 (*FAIL) force backtrack; synonym (*F) 648 (*MARK:NAME) set name to be passed back; synonym (*:NAME) 649</pre> 650The following act only when a subsequent match failure causes a backtrack to 651reach them. They all force a match failure, but they differ in what happens 652afterwards. Those that advance the start-of-match point do so only if the 653pattern is not anchored. 654<pre> 655 (*COMMIT) overall failure, no advance of starting point 656 (*PRUNE) advance to next starting character 657 (*SKIP) advance to current matching position 658 (*SKIP:NAME) advance to position corresponding to an earlier 659 (*MARK:NAME); if not found, the (*SKIP) is ignored 660 (*THEN) local failure, backtrack to next alternation 661</pre> 662The effect of one of these verbs in a group called as a subroutine is confined 663to the subroutine call. 664</P> 665<br><a name="SEC26" href="#TOC1">CALLOUTS</a><br> 666<P> 667<pre> 668 (?C) callout (assumed number 0) 669 (?Cn) callout with numerical data n 670 (?C"text") callout with string data 671</pre> 672The allowed string delimiters are ` ' " ^ % # $ (which are the same for the 673start and the end), and the starting delimiter { matched with the ending 674delimiter }. To encode the ending delimiter within the string, double it. 675</P> 676<br><a name="SEC27" href="#TOC1">SEE ALSO</a><br> 677<P> 678<b>pcre2pattern</b>(3), <b>pcre2api</b>(3), <b>pcre2callout</b>(3), 679<b>pcre2matching</b>(3), <b>pcre2</b>(3). 680</P> 681<br><a name="SEC28" href="#TOC1">AUTHOR</a><br> 682<P> 683Philip Hazel 684<br> 685University Computing Service 686<br> 687Cambridge, England. 688<br> 689</P> 690<br><a name="SEC29" href="#TOC1">REVISION</a><br> 691<P> 692Last updated: 28 December 2019 693<br> 694Copyright © 1997-2019 University of Cambridge. 695<br> 696<p> 697Return to the <a href="index.html">PCRE2 index page</a>. 698</p> 699