3 ms·

VerbalExpressions – JavaScript library that helps construct regular expressions

18 points by shadeless 13y ago

peteratt 13y ago
Damn, this is so simple yet so powerful I can't believe it's the first time anyone has thought about it.
- DavidBradbury 13y ago
  > I can't believe it's the first time anyone has thought about it. Implying this is?
  - peteratt 13y ago
    Not implying that, but haven't seen something as similar and high-level before.
nahname 13y ago
I have always struggled writing a regular expressions. Even after being successful in writing one, I could not retain what it did once I returned to it. This library is definitely for people like me.
__david__ 13y ago
That's cute and on one hand I like the concept, but on the other hand I find that's exactly how normal terse regexs read to me anyway... ^https?://(?:www\.)?[^ ]*$ is way more succinct and just as easy to read as: .startOfLine() .then( "http" ) .maybe( "s" ) .then( "://" ) .maybe( "www." ) .anythingBut( " " ) .endOfLine(); Well... assuming you know regular expressions. Which you should if you are a programmer.
- AdrianRossouw 13y ago
  i could see it useful if you had a situation where you need to programmatically generate a regex, but i don't really see myself using it much at all.
- xtrumanx 13y ago
  I kind of know regular expressions but every time I have to write one I head off to regexpal to write it. For instance, off the top of my head, I have no idea what the "?" in the parenthesis does. Usually expect a character to precede a "?", "." or "*". I also don't use them often enough to commit all the rules to memory. However, given VerbalExpressions, I don't think I'd have a problem building regular expressions. For a newbie, startOfLine and endOfLine is far more memorable than "^" and "$". > Which you should if you are a programmer. You can be pretty productive programmer without knowing regular expressions. Depends on the kind of programming you do really.
- AndrewDucker 13y ago
  There are ten thousand things I "should" know as a programmer. And I use regular expressions about once per year, which is long enough for them to become unreadable between usages, and require me to spend a chunk of time looking up syntax for even the simplest of them.
hsmyers 13y ago
As a diabetic, I try and not over-dose on syntactic sugar...

18 points by shadeless 13y ago

peteratt 13y ago

Damn, this is so simple yet so powerful I can't believe it's the first time anyone has thought about it.

DavidBradbury 13y ago
> I can't believe it's the first time anyone has thought about it. Implying this is?
- peteratt 13y ago
  Not implying that, but haven't seen something as similar and high-level before.

nahname 13y ago

I have always struggled writing a regular expressions. Even after being successful in writing one, I could not retain what it did once I returned to it. This library is definitely for people like me.

__david__ 13y ago

That's cute and on one hand I like the concept, but on the other hand I find that's exactly how normal terse regexs read to me anyway... ^https?://(?:www\.)?[^ ]*$ is way more succinct and just as easy to read as: .startOfLine() .then( "http" ) .maybe( "s" ) .then( "://" ) .maybe( "www." ) .anythingBut( " " ) .endOfLine(); Well... assuming you know regular expressions. Which you should if you are a programmer.

AdrianRossouw 13y ago
i could see it useful if you had a situation where you need to programmatically generate a regex, but i don't really see myself using it much at all.
xtrumanx 13y ago
I kind of know regular expressions but every time I have to write one I head off to regexpal to write it. For instance, off the top of my head, I have no idea what the "?" in the parenthesis does. Usually expect a character to precede a "?", "." or "*". I also don't use them often enough to commit all the rules to memory. However, given VerbalExpressions, I don't think I'd have a problem building regular expressions. For a newbie, startOfLine and endOfLine is far more memorable than "^" and "$". > Which you should if you are a programmer. You can be pretty productive programmer without knowing regular expressions. Depends on the kind of programming you do really.
AndrewDucker 13y ago
There are ten thousand things I "should" know as a programmer. And I use regular expressions about once per year, which is long enough for them to become unreadable between usages, and require me to spend a chunk of time looking up syntax for even the simplest of them.

hsmyers 13y ago

As a diabetic, I try and not over-dose on syntactic sugar...