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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">BINARY PROPERTIES FOR \p AND \P</a>
23<li><a name="TOC8" href="#SEC8">SCRIPT MATCHING WITH \p AND \P</a>
24<li><a name="TOC9" href="#SEC9">THE BIDI_CLASS PROPERTY FOR \p AND \P</a>
25<li><a name="TOC10" href="#SEC10">CHARACTER CLASSES</a>
26<li><a name="TOC11" href="#SEC11">QUANTIFIERS</a>
27<li><a name="TOC12" href="#SEC12">ANCHORS AND SIMPLE ASSERTIONS</a>
28<li><a name="TOC13" href="#SEC13">REPORTED MATCH POINT SETTING</a>
29<li><a name="TOC14" href="#SEC14">ALTERNATION</a>
30<li><a name="TOC15" href="#SEC15">CAPTURING</a>
31<li><a name="TOC16" href="#SEC16">ATOMIC GROUPS</a>
32<li><a name="TOC17" href="#SEC17">COMMENT</a>
33<li><a name="TOC18" href="#SEC18">OPTION SETTING</a>
34<li><a name="TOC19" href="#SEC19">NEWLINE CONVENTION</a>
35<li><a name="TOC20" href="#SEC20">WHAT \R MATCHES</a>
36<li><a name="TOC21" href="#SEC21">LOOKAHEAD AND LOOKBEHIND ASSERTIONS</a>
37<li><a name="TOC22" href="#SEC22">NON-ATOMIC LOOKAROUND ASSERTIONS</a>
38<li><a name="TOC23" href="#SEC23">SCRIPT RUNS</a>
39<li><a name="TOC24" href="#SEC24">BACKREFERENCES</a>
40<li><a name="TOC25" href="#SEC25">SUBROUTINE REFERENCES (POSSIBLY RECURSIVE)</a>
41<li><a name="TOC26" href="#SEC26">CONDITIONAL PATTERNS</a>
42<li><a name="TOC27" href="#SEC27">BACKTRACKING CONTROL</a>
43<li><a name="TOC28" href="#SEC28">CALLOUTS</a>
44<li><a name="TOC29" href="#SEC29">SEE ALSO</a>
45<li><a name="TOC30" href="#SEC30">AUTHOR</a>
46<li><a name="TOC31" href="#SEC31">REVISION</a>
47</ul>
48<br><a name="SEC1" href="#TOC1">PCRE2 REGULAR EXPRESSION SYNTAX SUMMARY</a><br>
49<P>
50The full syntax and semantics of the regular expressions that are supported by
51PCRE2 are described in the
52<a href="pcre2pattern.html"><b>pcre2pattern</b></a>
53documentation. This document contains a quick-reference summary of the syntax.
54</P>
55<br><a name="SEC2" href="#TOC1">QUOTING</a><br>
56<P>
57<pre>
58  \x         where x is non-alphanumeric is a literal x
59  \Q...\E    treat enclosed characters as literal
60</PRE>
61</P>
62<br><a name="SEC3" href="#TOC1">ESCAPED CHARACTERS</a><br>
63<P>
64This table applies to ASCII and Unicode environments. An unrecognized escape
65sequence causes an error.
66<pre>
67  \a         alarm, that is, the BEL character (hex 07)
68  \cx        "control-x", where x is any ASCII printing character
69  \e         escape (hex 1B)
70  \f         form feed (hex 0C)
71  \n         newline (hex 0A)
72  \r         carriage return (hex 0D)
73  \t         tab (hex 09)
74  \0dd       character with octal code 0dd
75  \ddd       character with octal code ddd, or backreference
76  \o{ddd..}  character with octal code ddd..
77  \N{U+hh..} character with Unicode code point hh.. (Unicode mode only)
78  \xhh       character with hex code hh
79  \x{hh..}   character with hex code hh..
80</pre>
81If PCRE2_ALT_BSUX or PCRE2_EXTRA_ALT_BSUX is set ("ALT_BSUX mode"), the
82following are also recognized:
83<pre>
84  \U         the character "U"
85  \uhhhh     character with hex code hhhh
86  \u{hh..}   character with hex code hh.. but only for EXTRA_ALT_BSUX
87</pre>
88When \x is not followed by {, from zero to two hexadecimal digits are read,
89but in ALT_BSUX mode \x must be followed by two hexadecimal digits to be
90recognized as a hexadecimal escape; otherwise it matches a literal "x".
91Likewise, if \u (in ALT_BSUX mode) is not followed by four hexadecimal digits
92or (in EXTRA_ALT_BSUX mode) a sequence of hex digits in curly brackets, it
93matches a literal "u".
94</P>
95<P>
96Note that \0dd is always an octal code. The treatment of backslash followed by
97a non-zero digit is complicated; for details see the section
98<a href="pcre2pattern.html#digitsafterbackslash">"Non-printing characters"</a>
99in the
100<a href="pcre2pattern.html"><b>pcre2pattern</b></a>
101documentation, where details of escape processing in EBCDIC environments are
102also given. \N{U+hh..} is synonymous with \x{hh..} in PCRE2 but is not
103supported in EBCDIC environments. Note that \N not followed by an opening
104curly bracket has a different meaning (see below).
105</P>
106<br><a name="SEC4" href="#TOC1">CHARACTER TYPES</a><br>
107<P>
108<pre>
109  .          any character except newline;
110               in dotall mode, any character whatsoever
111  \C         one code unit, even in UTF mode (best avoided)
112  \d         a decimal digit
113  \D         a character that is not a decimal digit
114  \h         a horizontal white space character
115  \H         a character that is not a horizontal white space character
116  \N         a character that is not a newline
117  \p{<i>xx</i>}     a character with the <i>xx</i> property
118  \P{<i>xx</i>}     a character without the <i>xx</i> property
119  \R         a newline sequence
120  \s         a white space character
121  \S         a character that is not a white space character
122  \v         a vertical white space character
123  \V         a character that is not a vertical white space character
124  \w         a "word" character
125  \W         a "non-word" character
126  \X         a Unicode extended grapheme cluster
127</pre>
128\C is dangerous because it may leave the current matching point in the middle
129of a UTF-8 or UTF-16 character. The application can lock out the use of \C by
130setting the PCRE2_NEVER_BACKSLASH_C option. It is also possible to build PCRE2
131with the use of \C permanently disabled.
132</P>
133<P>
134By default, \d, \s, and \w match only ASCII characters, even in UTF-8 mode
135or in the 16-bit and 32-bit libraries. However, if locale-specific matching is
136happening, \s and \w may also match characters with code points in the range
137128-255. If the PCRE2_UCP option is set, the behaviour of these escape
138sequences is changed to use Unicode properties and they match many more
139characters.
140</P>
141<P>
142Property descriptions in \p and \P are matched caselessly; hyphens,
143underscores, and white space are ignored, in accordance with Unicode's "loose
144matching" rules.
145</P>
146<br><a name="SEC5" href="#TOC1">GENERAL CATEGORY PROPERTIES FOR \p and \P</a><br>
147<P>
148<pre>
149  C          Other
150  Cc         Control
151  Cf         Format
152  Cn         Unassigned
153  Co         Private use
154  Cs         Surrogate
155
156  L          Letter
157  Ll         Lower case letter
158  Lm         Modifier letter
159  Lo         Other letter
160  Lt         Title case letter
161  Lu         Upper case letter
162  Lc         Ll, Lu, or Lt
163  L&         Ll, Lu, or Lt
164
165  M          Mark
166  Mc         Spacing mark
167  Me         Enclosing mark
168  Mn         Non-spacing mark
169
170  N          Number
171  Nd         Decimal number
172  Nl         Letter number
173  No         Other number
174
175  P          Punctuation
176  Pc         Connector punctuation
177  Pd         Dash punctuation
178  Pe         Close punctuation
179  Pf         Final punctuation
180  Pi         Initial punctuation
181  Po         Other punctuation
182  Ps         Open punctuation
183
184  S          Symbol
185  Sc         Currency symbol
186  Sk         Modifier symbol
187  Sm         Mathematical symbol
188  So         Other symbol
189
190  Z          Separator
191  Zl         Line separator
192  Zp         Paragraph separator
193  Zs         Space separator
194</PRE>
195</P>
196<br><a name="SEC6" href="#TOC1">PCRE2 SPECIAL CATEGORY PROPERTIES FOR \p and \P</a><br>
197<P>
198<pre>
199  Xan        Alphanumeric: union of properties L and N
200  Xps        POSIX space: property Z or tab, NL, VT, FF, CR
201  Xsp        Perl space: property Z or tab, NL, VT, FF, CR
202  Xuc        Univerally-named character: one that can be
203               represented by a Universal Character Name
204  Xwd        Perl word: property Xan or underscore
205</pre>
206Perl and POSIX space are now the same. Perl added VT to its space character set
207at release 5.18.
208</P>
209<br><a name="SEC7" href="#TOC1">BINARY PROPERTIES FOR \p AND \P</a><br>
210<P>
211Unicode defines a number of binary properties, that is, properties whose only
212values are true or false. You can obtain a list of those that are recognized by
213\p and \P, along with their abbreviations, by running this command:
214<pre>
215  pcre2test -LP
216</PRE>
217</P>
218<br><a name="SEC8" href="#TOC1">SCRIPT MATCHING WITH \p AND \P</a><br>
219<P>
220Many script names and their 4-letter abbreviations are recognized in
221\p{sc:...} or \p{scx:...} items, or on their own with \p (and also \P of
222course). You can obtain a list of these scripts by running this command:
223<pre>
224  pcre2test -LS
225</PRE>
226</P>
227<br><a name="SEC9" href="#TOC1">THE BIDI_CLASS PROPERTY FOR \p AND \P</a><br>
228<P>
229<pre>
230  \p{Bidi_Class:&#60;class&#62;}   matches a character with the given class
231  \p{BC:&#60;class&#62;}           matches a character with the given class
232</pre>
233The recognized classes are:
234<pre>
235  AL          Arabic letter
236  AN          Arabic number
237  B           paragraph separator
238  BN          boundary neutral
239  CS          common separator
240  EN          European number
241  ES          European separator
242  ET          European terminator
243  FSI         first strong isolate
244  L           left-to-right
245  LRE         left-to-right embedding
246  LRI         left-to-right isolate
247  LRO         left-to-right override
248  NSM         non-spacing mark
249  ON          other neutral
250  PDF         pop directional format
251  PDI         pop directional isolate
252  R           right-to-left
253  RLE         right-to-left embedding
254  RLI         right-to-left isolate
255  RLO         right-to-left override
256  S           segment separator
257  WS          which space
258</PRE>
259</P>
260<br><a name="SEC10" href="#TOC1">CHARACTER CLASSES</a><br>
261<P>
262<pre>
263  [...]       positive character class
264  [^...]      negative character class
265  [x-y]       range (can be used for hex characters)
266  [[:xxx:]]   positive POSIX named set
267  [[:^xxx:]]  negative POSIX named set
268
269  alnum       alphanumeric
270  alpha       alphabetic
271  ascii       0-127
272  blank       space or tab
273  cntrl       control character
274  digit       decimal digit
275  graph       printing, excluding space
276  lower       lower case letter
277  print       printing, including space
278  punct       printing, excluding alphanumeric
279  space       white space
280  upper       upper case letter
281  word        same as \w
282  xdigit      hexadecimal digit
283</pre>
284In PCRE2, POSIX character set names recognize only ASCII characters by default,
285but some of them use Unicode properties if PCRE2_UCP is set. You can use
286\Q...\E inside a character class.
287</P>
288<br><a name="SEC11" href="#TOC1">QUANTIFIERS</a><br>
289<P>
290<pre>
291  ?           0 or 1, greedy
292  ?+          0 or 1, possessive
293  ??          0 or 1, lazy
294  *           0 or more, greedy
295  *+          0 or more, possessive
296  *?          0 or more, lazy
297  +           1 or more, greedy
298  ++          1 or more, possessive
299  +?          1 or more, lazy
300  {n}         exactly n
301  {n,m}       at least n, no more than m, greedy
302  {n,m}+      at least n, no more than m, possessive
303  {n,m}?      at least n, no more than m, lazy
304  {n,}        n or more, greedy
305  {n,}+       n or more, possessive
306  {n,}?       n or more, lazy
307</PRE>
308</P>
309<br><a name="SEC12" href="#TOC1">ANCHORS AND SIMPLE ASSERTIONS</a><br>
310<P>
311<pre>
312  \b          word boundary
313  \B          not a word boundary
314  ^           start of subject
315                also after an internal newline in multiline mode
316                (after any newline if PCRE2_ALT_CIRCUMFLEX is set)
317  \A          start of subject
318  $           end of subject
319                also before newline at end of subject
320                also before internal newline in multiline mode
321  \Z          end of subject
322                also before newline at end of subject
323  \z          end of subject
324  \G          first matching position in subject
325</PRE>
326</P>
327<br><a name="SEC13" href="#TOC1">REPORTED MATCH POINT SETTING</a><br>
328<P>
329<pre>
330  \K          set reported start of match
331</pre>
332From release 10.38 \K is not permitted by default in lookaround assertions,
333for compatibility with Perl. However, if the PCRE2_EXTRA_ALLOW_LOOKAROUND_BSK
334option is set, the previous behaviour is re-enabled. When this option is set,
335\K is honoured in positive assertions, but ignored in negative ones.
336</P>
337<br><a name="SEC14" href="#TOC1">ALTERNATION</a><br>
338<P>
339<pre>
340  expr|expr|expr...
341</PRE>
342</P>
343<br><a name="SEC15" href="#TOC1">CAPTURING</a><br>
344<P>
345<pre>
346  (...)           capture group
347  (?&#60;name&#62;...)    named capture group (Perl)
348  (?'name'...)    named capture group (Perl)
349  (?P&#60;name&#62;...)   named capture group (Python)
350  (?:...)         non-capture group
351  (?|...)         non-capture group; reset group numbers for
352                   capture groups in each alternative
353</pre>
354In non-UTF modes, names may contain underscores and ASCII letters and digits;
355in UTF modes, any Unicode letters and Unicode decimal digits are permitted. In
356both cases, a name must not start with a digit.
357</P>
358<br><a name="SEC16" href="#TOC1">ATOMIC GROUPS</a><br>
359<P>
360<pre>
361  (?&#62;...)         atomic non-capture group
362  (*atomic:...)   atomic non-capture group
363</PRE>
364</P>
365<br><a name="SEC17" href="#TOC1">COMMENT</a><br>
366<P>
367<pre>
368  (?#....)        comment (not nestable)
369</PRE>
370</P>
371<br><a name="SEC18" href="#TOC1">OPTION SETTING</a><br>
372<P>
373Changes of these options within a group are automatically cancelled at the end
374of the group.
375<pre>
376  (?i)            caseless
377  (?J)            allow duplicate named groups
378  (?m)            multiline
379  (?n)            no auto capture
380  (?s)            single line (dotall)
381  (?U)            default ungreedy (lazy)
382  (?x)            extended: ignore white space except in classes
383  (?xx)           as (?x) but also ignore space and tab in classes
384  (?-...)         unset option(s)
385  (?^)            unset imnsx options
386</pre>
387Unsetting x or xx unsets both. Several options may be set at once, and a
388mixture of setting and unsetting such as (?i-x) is allowed, but there may be
389only one hyphen. Setting (but no unsetting) is allowed after (?^ for example
390(?^in). An option setting may appear at the start of a non-capture group, for
391example (?i:...).
392</P>
393<P>
394The following are recognized only at the very start of a pattern or after one
395of the newline or \R options with similar syntax. More than one of them may
396appear. For the first three, d is a decimal number.
397<pre>
398  (*LIMIT_DEPTH=d) set the backtracking limit to d
399  (*LIMIT_HEAP=d)  set the heap size limit to d * 1024 bytes
400  (*LIMIT_MATCH=d) set the match limit to d
401  (*NOTEMPTY)      set PCRE2_NOTEMPTY when matching
402  (*NOTEMPTY_ATSTART) set PCRE2_NOTEMPTY_ATSTART when matching
403  (*NO_AUTO_POSSESS) no auto-possessification (PCRE2_NO_AUTO_POSSESS)
404  (*NO_DOTSTAR_ANCHOR) no .* anchoring (PCRE2_NO_DOTSTAR_ANCHOR)
405  (*NO_JIT)       disable JIT optimization
406  (*NO_START_OPT) no start-match optimization (PCRE2_NO_START_OPTIMIZE)
407  (*UTF)          set appropriate UTF mode for the library in use
408  (*UCP)          set PCRE2_UCP (use Unicode properties for \d etc)
409</pre>
410Note that LIMIT_DEPTH, LIMIT_HEAP, and LIMIT_MATCH can only reduce the value of
411the limits set by the caller of <b>pcre2_match()</b> or <b>pcre2_dfa_match()</b>,
412not increase them. LIMIT_RECURSION is an obsolete synonym for LIMIT_DEPTH. The
413application can lock out the use of (*UTF) and (*UCP) by setting the
414PCRE2_NEVER_UTF or PCRE2_NEVER_UCP options, respectively, at compile time.
415</P>
416<br><a name="SEC19" href="#TOC1">NEWLINE CONVENTION</a><br>
417<P>
418These are recognized only at the very start of the pattern or after option
419settings with a similar syntax.
420<pre>
421  (*CR)           carriage return only
422  (*LF)           linefeed only
423  (*CRLF)         carriage return followed by linefeed
424  (*ANYCRLF)      all three of the above
425  (*ANY)          any Unicode newline sequence
426  (*NUL)          the NUL character (binary zero)
427</PRE>
428</P>
429<br><a name="SEC20" href="#TOC1">WHAT \R MATCHES</a><br>
430<P>
431These are recognized only at the very start of the pattern or after option
432setting with a similar syntax.
433<pre>
434  (*BSR_ANYCRLF)  CR, LF, or CRLF
435  (*BSR_UNICODE)  any Unicode newline sequence
436</PRE>
437</P>
438<br><a name="SEC21" href="#TOC1">LOOKAHEAD AND LOOKBEHIND ASSERTIONS</a><br>
439<P>
440<pre>
441  (?=...)                     )
442  (*pla:...)                  ) positive lookahead
443  (*positive_lookahead:...)   )
444
445  (?!...)                     )
446  (*nla:...)                  ) negative lookahead
447  (*negative_lookahead:...)   )
448
449  (?&#60;=...)                    )
450  (*plb:...)                  ) positive lookbehind
451  (*positive_lookbehind:...)  )
452
453  (?&#60;!...)                    )
454  (*nlb:...)                  ) negative lookbehind
455  (*negative_lookbehind:...)  )
456</pre>
457Each top-level branch of a lookbehind must be of a fixed length.
458</P>
459<br><a name="SEC22" href="#TOC1">NON-ATOMIC LOOKAROUND ASSERTIONS</a><br>
460<P>
461These assertions are specific to PCRE2 and are not Perl-compatible.
462<pre>
463  (?*...)                                )
464  (*napla:...)                           ) synonyms
465  (*non_atomic_positive_lookahead:...)   )
466
467  (?&#60;*...)                               )
468  (*naplb:...)                           ) synonyms
469  (*non_atomic_positive_lookbehind:...)  )
470</PRE>
471</P>
472<br><a name="SEC23" href="#TOC1">SCRIPT RUNS</a><br>
473<P>
474<pre>
475  (*script_run:...)           ) script run, can be backtracked into
476  (*sr:...)                   )
477
478  (*atomic_script_run:...)    ) atomic script run
479  (*asr:...)                  )
480</PRE>
481</P>
482<br><a name="SEC24" href="#TOC1">BACKREFERENCES</a><br>
483<P>
484<pre>
485  \n              reference by number (can be ambiguous)
486  \gn             reference by number
487  \g{n}           reference by number
488  \g+n            relative reference by number (PCRE2 extension)
489  \g-n            relative reference by number
490  \g{+n}          relative reference by number (PCRE2 extension)
491  \g{-n}          relative reference by number
492  \k&#60;name&#62;        reference by name (Perl)
493  \k'name'        reference by name (Perl)
494  \g{name}        reference by name (Perl)
495  \k{name}        reference by name (.NET)
496  (?P=name)       reference by name (Python)
497</PRE>
498</P>
499<br><a name="SEC25" href="#TOC1">SUBROUTINE REFERENCES (POSSIBLY RECURSIVE)</a><br>
500<P>
501<pre>
502  (?R)            recurse whole pattern
503  (?n)            call subroutine by absolute number
504  (?+n)           call subroutine by relative number
505  (?-n)           call subroutine by relative number
506  (?&name)        call subroutine by name (Perl)
507  (?P&#62;name)       call subroutine by name (Python)
508  \g&#60;name&#62;        call subroutine by name (Oniguruma)
509  \g'name'        call subroutine by name (Oniguruma)
510  \g&#60;n&#62;           call subroutine by absolute number (Oniguruma)
511  \g'n'           call subroutine by absolute number (Oniguruma)
512  \g&#60;+n&#62;          call subroutine by relative number (PCRE2 extension)
513  \g'+n'          call subroutine by relative number (PCRE2 extension)
514  \g&#60;-n&#62;          call subroutine by relative number (PCRE2 extension)
515  \g'-n'          call subroutine by relative number (PCRE2 extension)
516</PRE>
517</P>
518<br><a name="SEC26" href="#TOC1">CONDITIONAL PATTERNS</a><br>
519<P>
520<pre>
521  (?(condition)yes-pattern)
522  (?(condition)yes-pattern|no-pattern)
523
524  (?(n)               absolute reference condition
525  (?(+n)              relative reference condition
526  (?(-n)              relative reference condition
527  (?(&#60;name&#62;)          named reference condition (Perl)
528  (?('name')          named reference condition (Perl)
529  (?(name)            named reference condition (PCRE2, deprecated)
530  (?(R)               overall recursion condition
531  (?(Rn)              specific numbered group recursion condition
532  (?(R&name)          specific named group recursion condition
533  (?(DEFINE)          define groups for reference
534  (?(VERSION[&#62;]=n.m)  test PCRE2 version
535  (?(assert)          assertion condition
536</pre>
537Note the ambiguity of (?(R) and (?(Rn) which might be named reference
538conditions or recursion tests. Such a condition is interpreted as a reference
539condition if the relevant named group exists.
540</P>
541<br><a name="SEC27" href="#TOC1">BACKTRACKING CONTROL</a><br>
542<P>
543All backtracking control verbs may be in the form (*VERB:NAME). For (*MARK) the
544name is mandatory, for the others it is optional. (*SKIP) changes its behaviour
545if :NAME is present. The others just set a name for passing back to the caller,
546but this is not a name that (*SKIP) can see. The following act immediately they
547are reached:
548<pre>
549  (*ACCEPT)       force successful match
550  (*FAIL)         force backtrack; synonym (*F)
551  (*MARK:NAME)    set name to be passed back; synonym (*:NAME)
552</pre>
553The following act only when a subsequent match failure causes a backtrack to
554reach them. They all force a match failure, but they differ in what happens
555afterwards. Those that advance the start-of-match point do so only if the
556pattern is not anchored.
557<pre>
558  (*COMMIT)       overall failure, no advance of starting point
559  (*PRUNE)        advance to next starting character
560  (*SKIP)         advance to current matching position
561  (*SKIP:NAME)    advance to position corresponding to an earlier
562                  (*MARK:NAME); if not found, the (*SKIP) is ignored
563  (*THEN)         local failure, backtrack to next alternation
564</pre>
565The effect of one of these verbs in a group called as a subroutine is confined
566to the subroutine call.
567</P>
568<br><a name="SEC28" href="#TOC1">CALLOUTS</a><br>
569<P>
570<pre>
571  (?C)            callout (assumed number 0)
572  (?Cn)           callout with numerical data n
573  (?C"text")      callout with string data
574</pre>
575The allowed string delimiters are ` ' " ^ % # $ (which are the same for the
576start and the end), and the starting delimiter { matched with the ending
577delimiter }. To encode the ending delimiter within the string, double it.
578</P>
579<br><a name="SEC29" href="#TOC1">SEE ALSO</a><br>
580<P>
581<b>pcre2pattern</b>(3), <b>pcre2api</b>(3), <b>pcre2callout</b>(3),
582<b>pcre2matching</b>(3), <b>pcre2</b>(3).
583</P>
584<br><a name="SEC30" href="#TOC1">AUTHOR</a><br>
585<P>
586Philip Hazel
587<br>
588Retired from University Computing Service
589<br>
590Cambridge, England.
591<br>
592</P>
593<br><a name="SEC31" href="#TOC1">REVISION</a><br>
594<P>
595Last updated: 12 January 2022
596<br>
597Copyright &copy; 1997-2022 University of Cambridge.
598<br>
599<p>
600Return to the <a href="index.html">PCRE2 index page</a>.
601</p>
602