Match Method (String, String, RegexOptions, TimeSpan)

Regex.Match Method (String, String, RegexOptions, TimeSpan)

[ This article is for Windows Phone 8 developers. If you’re developing for Windows 10, see the latest documentation. ]

Searches the input string for the first occurrence of the specified regular expression, using the specified matching options and time-out interval.

Namespace:  System.Text.RegularExpressions
Assembly:  System (in System.dll)

'Declaration
Public Shared Function Match ( _
	input As String, _
	pattern As String, _
	options As RegexOptions, _
	matchTimeout As TimeSpan _
) As Match

Parameters

input
Type: System.String
The string to search for a match.
pattern
Type: System.String
The regular expression pattern to match.
options
Type: System.Text.RegularExpressions.RegexOptions
A bitwise combination of the enumeration values that provide options for matching.
matchTimeout
Type: System.TimeSpan
A time-out interval, or Regex.InfiniteMatchTimeout to indicate that the method should not time out.

Return Value

Type: System.Text.RegularExpressions.Match
An object that contains information about the match.

ExceptionCondition
ArgumentException

A regular expression parsing error occurred.

ArgumentNullException

input or pattern is Nothing.

ArgumentOutOfRangeException

options is not a valid bitwise combination of RegexOptions values.

RegexMatchTimeoutException

A time-out occurred. For more information about time-outs, see the Remarks section.

The static Match method is equivalent to constructing a Regex object with the Regex constructor and calling the instance Match(String) method.

The pattern parameter consists of regular expression language elements that symbolically describe the string to match. For more information about regular expressions, see Regular Expression Language - Quick Reference and [930653a6-95d2-4697-9d5a-52d11bb6fd4c].

You can determine whether the regular expression pattern has been found in the input string by checking the value of the returned Match object's Success property. If a match is found, the returned Match object's Value property contains the substring from input that matches the regular expression pattern. If no match is found, its value is String.Empty.

This method returns the first substring found in input that matches the regular expression pattern. You can retrieve subsequent matches by repeatedly calling the returned Match object's NextMatch method. You can also retrieve all matches in a single method call by calling the Regex.Matches(String, String, RegexOptions) method.

The matchTimeout parameter specifies how long a pattern matching method should try to find a match before it times out. Setting a time-out interval prevents regular expressions that rely on excessive backtracking from appearing to stop responding when they process input that contains near matches. For more information, see [618e5afb-3a97-440d-831a-70e4c526a51c] and [34df1152-0b22-4a1c-a76c-3c28c47b70d8]. If no match is found in that time interval, the method throws a RegexMatchTimeoutException exception. matchTimeout overrides any default time-out value defined for the application domain in which the method executes.

Notes to Callers

We recommend that you set the matchTimeout parameter to an appropriate value, such as two seconds. If you disable time-outs by specifying Regex.InfiniteMatchTimeout, the regular expression engine offers slightly better performance. However, you should disable time-outs only under the following conditions:

  • When the input processed by a regular expression is derived from a known and trusted source or consists of static text. This excludes text that has been dynamically input by users.

  • When the regular expression pattern has been thoroughly tested to ensure that it efficiently handles matches, non-matches, and near matches.

  • When the regular expression pattern contains no language elements that are known to cause excessive backtracking when processing a near match.

Windows Phone OS

Supported in: 8.1, 8.0

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