NAME

regcmp - regular expression compile

SYNOPSIS

regcmp [-] file...

DESCRIPTION

The regcmp command performs a function similar to regcmp and, in most cases, precludes the need for calling regcmp from C programs. Bypassing regcmp saves on both execution time and program size. The command regcmp compiles the regular expressions in file and places the output in file.i. If the - option is used, the output is placed in file.c. The format of entries in file is a name (C variable) followed by one or more blanks followed by one or more regular expressions enclosed in double quotes. The output of regcmp is C source code. Compiled regular expressions are represented as extern char vectors. file.i files may thus be #included in C programs, or file.c files may be compiled and later loaded. In the C program that uses the regcmp output, regex(abc,line) applies the regular expression named abc to line. Diagnostics are self-explanatory.

EXAMPLES

name     "([A-Za-z][A-Za-z0-9_]*)$0"

telno    "\({0,1}([2-9][01][1-9])$0\){0,1} *"
         "([2-9][0-9]{2})$1[ -]{0,1}"
         "([0-9]{4})$2"

The three arguments to telno shown above must all be entered on one line.

In the C program that uses the regcmp output,

regex(telno, line, area, exch, rest)

applies the regular expression named telno to line.

SEE ALSO

regcmp(3G).