Regex Tips

Regex Tips

The search uses Java's java.util.regex engine (similar to PCRE). Regex mode is enabled by checking the Regex checkbox.

In non-regex mode, all characters are treated as literals — just type exactly what you're looking for, including dots, parentheses, and other special characters.

Common Patterns

Pattern	Matches
channelMap\.get	Literal channelMap.get (dot must be escaped)
channelMap\.(get|put)	channelMap.get or channelMap.put
logger\.(info|error|warn)	Any of the three log levels
(?i)patient	Case-insensitive "patient" (alternative to the checkbox)
TODO|FIXME|HACK	Common code markers
2\.16\.840\.1\.113883	OID prefix (dots escaped)
globalMap\.get\(['"]	globalMap.get(' or globalMap.get("
new\s+Date\(\)	new Date() with any whitespace
throw\s+new	Throw statements
catch\s*\(	Catch blocks
var\s+\w+\s*=\s*msg	Variables assigned from msg

Characters That Need Escaping

In regex mode, the following characters have special meaning and must be escaped with a backslash (\) to match literally:

.  *  +  ?  ^  $  {  }  [  ]  (  )  |  \

For example, to search for channelMap.get(, use: channelMap\.get\(

Line-by-Line Matching

The search engine matches one line at a time. Multi-line patterns (patterns that span across line breaks) are not supported. Each line of each script is tested independently against the pattern.

This means patterns like function.*\n.*return will not work. Instead, search for a distinctive part of what you're looking for on a single line.

Performance Considerations

The search engine enforces a per-script timeout of 5 seconds for regex matching. If a regex takes too long on a particular script (typically due to catastrophic backtracking), the search will stop on that script and report a timeout in the results.

To avoid slow patterns:

• Prefer literal search (regex off) when you don't need pattern matching
• Avoid nested quantifiers like (a+)+ or (a*)*
• Avoid excessive alternation with overlapping patterns
• Keep patterns as specific as possible

Invalid Regex Handling

If you enter an invalid regular expression, the search will display an error message describing the problem rather than failing silently. The error message comes from Java's regex compiler and identifies the issue and position in the pattern.

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