Searching and Replacing
You can find and replace text using a variety of techniques. For example, you can use the Find and Replace dialog boxes. You can also search without a dialog box by using incremental search, or by using the Find box of the Standard toolbar. These techniques allow you to control the scope of find and replace and to choose the method of reviewing search matches and replacements.
You should consider the following information when you search and replace text:
- Options set in the Find or the Replace dialog box are global. That is, certain options selected in one dialog box are selected for all the dialogs. These options are Match case, Match whole word, Search All open documents, Wildcards, and Regular Expressions. This rule also applies to the Find box.
- Undo is available only for documents left open after a replace operation.
- Undo for a replace all operation that spans more than one file is considered a single, bulk action across all the affected files that were left open.
- Generally, you cannot search items with graphical structural views, such as Design View of the Script Editor.
Wildcards
The following expressions can replace characters or digits in your search string.
Note You must choose the Use check box in the Find or the Replace dialog box and select Wildcards before using any of the following as part of your search criteria.
| Expression | Syntax | Description | Example |
|---|---|---|---|
| Any single character | ? | Matches any character | |
| Any single digit | # | Matches any single digit | |
| Characters not in set | [! ] | Matches any one character that is not specified in the set | |
| One or more characters | * | Matches any one or more characters | |
| Set of characters | [ ] | Matches any one of the characters specified in the set |
Regular Expressions
You can use the following regular expressions in the Find or the Replace dialog box to refine and expand your search.
Note You must select the Use check box in the Find or the Replace dialog box before using any of the following as part of your search criteria.
The following expressions can be used to match characters or digits in your search string:
| Expression | Syntax | Description | Example |
|---|---|---|---|
| Any character | . | Matches any one character except a line break. | |
| Maximal-zero or more | * | Matches zero or more occurrences of the preceding expression. | |
| Maximal-one or more | + | Matches at least one occurrence of the preceding expression. | |
| Minimal zero or more | @ | Matches zero or more occurrences of the preceding expression, matching as few characters as possible. | |
| Minimal-one or more | # | Matches one or more occurrences of the preceding expression, matching as few characters as possible. | |
| Repeat n times | ^n | Matches n occurrences of the preceding expression. | [0-9]^4 matches any 4-digit sequence. |
| Set of characters | [] | Matches any one of the characters within the []. To specify a range of characters, list the starting and ending character separated by a dash (-), as in [a-z]. | |
| Character not in set | [^...] | Matches any character not in the set of characters following the ^. | |
| Beginning of line | ^ | Anchors the match to the beginning of a line. | |
| End of line | $ | Anchors the match to the end of a line. | |
| Beginning of word | < | Matches only when a word begins at this point in the text. | |
| End of word | > | Matches only when a word ends at this point in the text. | |
| Grouping | () | Groups a subexpression. | |
| Or | | | Matches the expression before or after the |. Mostly used within a group. | (sponge|mud) bath matches "sponge bath" and "mud bath". |
| Escape | \ | Matches the character following the backslash (\). This allows you to find characters used in the regular expression notation, such as { and ^. | \^ Searches for the ^ character. |
| Tagged expression | {} | Tags the text matched by the enclosed expression. | |
| nth tagged text | \n | In a find or replace expression, indicates the text matched by the nth tagged expression, where n is a number from 1 to 9.
In a replace expression, \0 inserts the entire matched text. |
|
| Right-justified field | \(w,n) | In a replace expression, right-justifies the nth tagged expression in a field at least w characters wide. | |
| Left-justified field | \(-w,n) | In a replace expression, left-justifies the nth tagged expression in a field at least w characters wide. | |
| Prevent match | ~X | Prevents a match when X appears at this point in the expression. | real~(ity) matches the "real" in "realty" and "really," but not the "real" in "reality". |
| Alphanumeric character | :a | Matches the expression ([a-zA-Z0-9]). |
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| Alphabetic character | :c | Matches the expression ([a-zA-Z]). |
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| Decimal digit | :d | Matches the expression ([0-9]). |
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| Hexadecimal digit | :h | Matches the expression ([0-9a-fA-F]+). |
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| Identifier | :i | Matches the expression ([a-zA-Z-$][a-zA-Z0-9_$]*). |
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| Rational number | :n | Matches the expression (([0-9]+.[0-9]*)|([0-9]*.[0-9]+)|([0-9]+)). |
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| Quoted string | :q | Matches the expression (("[^"]*")|('[^']*')). | |
| Alphabetic string | :w | Matches the expression ([a-zA-Z]+). |
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| Decimal integer | :z | Matches the expression ([0-9]+). |
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| Escape | \e | Unicode U+001B. | |
| Bell | \g | Unicode U+0007. | |
| Backspace | \h | Unicode U+0008. | |
| Line break | \n | Matches a platform-independent line break. In a replace expression, inserts a line break. | |
| Tab | \t | Matches a tab character, Unicode U+0009. | |
| Unicode character | \x#### or \u#### | Matches a character given by Unicode value where #### is hexadecimal digits. You can specify a character outside the Basic Multilingual Plane (that is, a surrogate) with the ISO 10646 code point or with two Unicode code points giving the values of the surrogate pair. |
The following table lists the syntax for matching by standard Unicode character properties. The two-letter abbreviation is the same as listed in the Unicode character properties database. These may be specified as part of a character set. For example, the expression [:Nd:Nl:No] matches any kind of digit.
| Expression | Syntax | Description | Example |
|---|---|---|---|
| Uppercase letter | :Lu | Matches any one capital letter. | :Luhe matches "The" but not "the". |
| Lowercase letter | :Ll | Matches any one lower case letter. | :Llhe matches "the" but not "The". |
| Title case letter | :Lt | Matches characters that combine an uppercase letter with a lowercase letter, such as Nj and Dz. | |
| Modifier letter | :Lm | ||
| Other letter | :Lo | ||
| Decimal digit | :Nd | Matches decimal digits such as 0-9 and their full-width equivalents. | |
| Letter digit | :Nl | ||
| Other digit | :No | ||
| Open punctuation | :Ps | Matches opening punctuation such as open brackets and braces. | |
| Close punctuation | :Pe | Matches closing punctuation such as closing brackets and braces. | |
| Initial quote punctuation | :Pi | Matches initial double quotation marks. | |
| Final quote punctuation | :Pf | Matches single quotation marks and ending double quotation marks. | |
| Dash punctuation | :Pd | Matches the dash mark. | |
| Connector punctuation | :Pc | Matches the underscore or underline mark. | |
| Other punctuation | :Po | Matches commas (,), ?, ", !, @, #, %, &, *, \, colons (:), semi-colons (;), ', and /. | |
| Space separator | :Zs | Matches blanks. | |
| Line separator | :Zl | Matches the Unicode character U+2028. | |
| Paragraph separator | :Zp | Matches the Unicode character U+2029. | |
| Non-spacing mark | :Mn | ||
| Combining mark | :Mc | ||
| Enclosing mark | :Me | ||
| Math symbol | :Sm | Matches +, =, ~, |, <, and >. | |
| Currency symbol | :Sc | Matches $ and other currency symbols. | |
| Modifier symbol | :Sk | ||
| Other symbol | :So | ||
| Other control | :Cc | Matches end of line. | |
| Other format | :Cf | Formatting control character such as the bidirectional control characters. | |
| Surrogate | :Cs | Matches one half of a surrogate pair. | |
| Other private-use | :Co | Matches any character from the private-use area. | |
| Other not assigned | :Cn |
In addition to the standard Unicode character properties, the following additional properties may be specified. These properties may be specified as part of a character set.
| Expression | Syntax | Description | Example |
|---|---|---|---|
| Alpha | :Al | Matches any one character. | :Alhe matches words such as "The", "then", and "reached". |
| Numeric | :Nu | Matches any one number or digit. | |
| Punctuation | :Pu | Matches any one punctuation mark, such as ?, @, ', etc. | |
| White space | :Wh | Matches all types of white space, including publishing and ideographic spaces. | |
| Bidi | :Bi | Matches characters from right-to-Left scripts such as Arabic and Hebrew. | |
| Hangul | :Ha | Matches Korean Hangul and combining Jamos. | |
| Hiragana | :Hi | Matches Hiragana characters. | |
| Katakana | :Ka | Matches katakana characters. | |
| Ideographic/Han/Kanji | :Id | Matches ideographic characters, such as Han and Kanji. |