Matcher

Appends a literal part of the input plus a replacement for the current match to a given StringBuffer. The literal part is exactly the part of the input between the previous match and the current match. The method can be used in conjunction with find() and appendTail(StringBuffer) to walk through the input and replace all occurrences of the Pattern with something else.

Appends the (unmatched) remainder of the input to the given StringBuffer. The method can be used in conjunction with find() and appendReplacement(StringBuffer, String) to walk through the input and replace all matches of the Pattern with something else.

Returns the index of the first character following the text that matched the whole regular expression.

Returns the index of the first character following the text that matched a given group.

Returns the next occurrence of the Pattern in the input. If a previous match was successful, the method continues the search from the first character following that match in the input. Otherwise it searches either from the region start (if one has been set), or from position 0.

Returns the next occurrence of the Pattern in the input. The method starts the search from the given character in the input.

Returns the text that matched the whole regular expression.

Returns the text that matched a given group of the regular expression. Explicit capturing groups in the pattern are numbered left to right in order of their opening parenthesis, starting at 1. The special group 0 represents the entire match (as if the entire pattern is surrounded by an implicit capturing group). For example, "a((b)c)" matching "abc" would give the following groups:

 0 "abc"
 1 "bc"
 2 "b"
 

An optional capturing group that failed to match as part of an overall successful match (for example, "a(b)?c" matching "ac") returns null. A capturing group that matched the empty string (for example, "a(b?)c" matching "ac") returns the empty string.

Returns the number of groups in the results, which is always equal to the number of groups in the original regular expression.

Indicates whether this matcher has anchoring bounds enabled. When anchoring bounds are enabled, the start and end of the input match the '^' and '$' meta-characters, otherwise not. Anchoring bounds are enabled by default.

Indicates whether this matcher has transparent bounds enabled. When transparent bounds are enabled, the parts of the input outside the region are subject to lookahead and lookbehind, otherwise they are not. Transparent bounds are disabled by default.

Indicates whether the last match hit the end of the input.

Tries to match the Pattern, starting from the beginning of the region (or the beginning of the input, if no region has been set). Doesn't require the Pattern to match against the whole region.

Tries to match the Pattern against the entire region (or the entire input, if no region has been set).

Returns the Pattern instance used inside this matcher.

Returns a replacement string for the given one that has all backslashes and dollar signs escaped.

Resets this matcher and sets a region. Only characters inside the region are considered for a match.

Returns this matcher's region end, that is, the first character that is not considered for a match.

Returns this matcher's region start, that is, the first character that is considered for a match.

Replaces all occurrences of this matcher's pattern in the input with a given string.

Replaces the first occurrence of this matcher's pattern in the input with a given string.

Indicates whether more input might change a successful match into an unsuccessful one.

Resets the Matcher. This results in the region being set to the whole input. Results of a previous find get lost. The next attempt to find an occurrence of the Pattern in the string will start at the beginning of the input.

Provides a new input and resets the Matcher. This results in the region being set to the whole input. Results of a previous find get lost. The next attempt to find an occurrence of the Pattern in the string will start at the beginning of the input.

Returns the index of the first character of the text that matched the whole regular expression.

Returns the index of the first character of the text that matched a given group.

Converts the current match into a separate MatchResult instance that is independent from this matcher. The new object is unaffected when the state of this matcher changes.

Determines whether this matcher has anchoring bounds enabled or not. When anchoring bounds are enabled, the start and end of the input match the '^' and '$' meta-characters, otherwise not. Anchoring bounds are enabled by default.

Sets a new pattern for the Matcher. Results of a previous find get lost. The next attempt to find an occurrence of the Pattern in the string will start at the beginning of the input.

Determines whether this matcher has transparent bounds enabled or not. When transparent bounds are enabled, the parts of the input outside the region are subject to lookahead and lookbehind, otherwise they are not. Transparent bounds are disabled by default.

Invoked when the garbage collector has detected that this instance is no longer reachable. The default implementation does nothing, but this method can be overridden to free resources.

Note that objects that override finalize are significantly more expensive than objects that don't. Finalizers may be run a long time after the object is no longer reachable, depending on memory pressure, so it's a bad idea to rely on them for cleanup. Note also that finalizers are run on a single VM-wide finalizer thread, so doing blocking work in a finalizer is a bad idea. A finalizer is usually only necessary for a class that has a native peer and needs to call a native method to destroy that peer. Even then, it's better to provide an explicit close method (and implement Closeable), and insist that callers manually dispose of instances. This works well for something like files, but less well for something like a BigInteger where typical calling code would have to deal with lots of temporaries. Unfortunately, code that creates lots of temporaries is the worst kind of code from the point of view of the single finalizer thread.

If you must use finalizers, consider at least providing your own ReferenceQueue and having your own thread process that queue.

Unlike constructors, finalizers are not automatically chained. You are responsible for calling super.finalize() yourself.

Uncaught exceptions thrown by finalizers are ignored and do not terminate the finalizer thread. See Effective Java Item 7, "Avoid finalizers" for more.