3 <title>pcre_compile specification</title>
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6 <h1>pcre_compile man page</h1>
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19 <b>#include <pcre.h></b>
22 <b>pcre *pcre_compile(const char *<i>pattern</i>, int <i>options</i>,</b>
23 <b> const char **<i>errptr</i>, int *<i>erroffset</i>,</b>
24 <b> const unsigned char *<i>tableptr</i>);</b>
27 <b>pcre16 *pcre16_compile(PCRE_SPTR16 <i>pattern</i>, int <i>options</i>,</b>
28 <b> const char **<i>errptr</i>, int *<i>erroffset</i>,</b>
29 <b> const unsigned char *<i>tableptr</i>);</b>
32 <b>pcre32 *pcre32_compile(PCRE_SPTR32 <i>pattern</i>, int <i>options</i>,</b>
33 <b> const char **<i>errptr</i>, int *<i>erroffset</i>,</b>
34 <b> const unsigned char *<i>tableptr</i>);</b>
40 This function compiles a regular expression into an internal form. It is the
41 same as <b>pcre[16|32]_compile2()</b>, except for the absence of the
42 <i>errorcodeptr</i> argument. Its arguments are:
44 <i>pattern</i> A zero-terminated string containing the
45 regular expression to be compiled
46 <i>options</i> Zero or more option bits
47 <i>errptr</i> Where to put an error message
48 <i>erroffset</i> Offset in pattern where error was found
49 <i>tableptr</i> Pointer to character tables, or NULL to
50 use the built-in default
54 PCRE_ANCHORED Force pattern anchoring
55 PCRE_AUTO_CALLOUT Compile automatic callouts
56 PCRE_BSR_ANYCRLF \R matches only CR, LF, or CRLF
57 PCRE_BSR_UNICODE \R matches all Unicode line endings
58 PCRE_CASELESS Do caseless matching
59 PCRE_DOLLAR_ENDONLY $ not to match newline at end
60 PCRE_DOTALL . matches anything including NL
61 PCRE_DUPNAMES Allow duplicate names for subpatterns
62 PCRE_EXTENDED Ignore white space and # comments
63 PCRE_EXTRA PCRE extra features
64 (not much use currently)
65 PCRE_FIRSTLINE Force matching to be before newline
66 PCRE_JAVASCRIPT_COMPAT JavaScript compatibility
67 PCRE_MULTILINE ^ and $ match newlines within data
68 PCRE_NEVER_UTF Lock out UTF, e.g. via (*UTF)
69 PCRE_NEWLINE_ANY Recognize any Unicode newline sequence
70 PCRE_NEWLINE_ANYCRLF Recognize CR, LF, and CRLF as newline
72 PCRE_NEWLINE_CR Set CR as the newline sequence
73 PCRE_NEWLINE_CRLF Set CRLF as the newline sequence
74 PCRE_NEWLINE_LF Set LF as the newline sequence
75 PCRE_NO_AUTO_CAPTURE Disable numbered capturing paren-
76 theses (named ones available)
77 PCRE_NO_AUTO_POSSESS Disable auto-possessification
78 PCRE_NO_START_OPTIMIZE Disable match-time start optimizations
79 PCRE_NO_UTF16_CHECK Do not check the pattern for UTF-16
80 validity (only relevant if
82 PCRE_NO_UTF32_CHECK Do not check the pattern for UTF-32
83 validity (only relevant if
85 PCRE_NO_UTF8_CHECK Do not check the pattern for UTF-8
86 validity (only relevant if
88 PCRE_UCP Use Unicode properties for \d, \w, etc.
89 PCRE_UNGREEDY Invert greediness of quantifiers
90 PCRE_UTF16 Run in <b>pcre16_compile()</b> UTF-16 mode
91 PCRE_UTF32 Run in <b>pcre32_compile()</b> UTF-32 mode
92 PCRE_UTF8 Run in <b>pcre_compile()</b> UTF-8 mode
94 PCRE must be built with UTF support in order to use PCRE_UTF8/16/32 and
95 PCRE_NO_UTF8/16/32_CHECK, and with UCP support if PCRE_UCP is used.
98 The yield of the function is a pointer to a private data structure that
99 contains the compiled pattern, or NULL if an error was detected. Note that
100 compiling regular expressions with one version of PCRE for use with a different
101 version is not guaranteed to work and may cause crashes.
104 There is a complete description of the PCRE native API in the
105 <a href="pcreapi.html"><b>pcreapi</b></a>
106 page and a description of the POSIX API in the
107 <a href="pcreposix.html"><b>pcreposix</b></a>
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