Remember that you can add an “i” to the end of a regular expression to make it ignore upper and lower case.
| Character | Meaning |
| . | a single character |
| [characters] | a single character from a list or range of characters |
| [^characters] | a single character not from a list or range of characters |
| ? | zero or one of the preceding piece of text |
| + | one or more of the preceding piece of text |
| * | zero or more of the preceding piece of text |
| (text) | group pieces of text for remembering later in $0 to $9 or for applying a ?, +, or * |
| | | choose between two or more options in a group of pieces |
| ^ | anchor the expression to the beginning of the line or text being searched |
| $ | anchor the expression to the end of the line or text being searched |
| \character | backquote the next character so that it means what it is rather than its meaning as a regular expression. |
For example, you might use /Dean ([A-Z]\. )?Martin/ to match Dean Martin, Dean M. Martin, Dean Q. Martin, or Dean Z. Martin.
Use =~ to see if the item on the left matches the regular expression, and !~ to see if the item on the left does not match the regular expression.
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