Capture Class

Definition

Namespace:

System.Text.RegularExpressions

Assembly:

System.Text.RegularExpressions.dll

Source:

Capture.cs

Represents the results from a single successful subexpression capture.

public ref class Capture

public class Capture

type Capture = class

Public Class Capture

Inheritance

Object

Capture

Derived

System.Text.RegularExpressions.Group

Examples

The following example defines a regular expression that matches sentences that contain no punctuation except for a period (".").

using System;
using System.Text.RegularExpressions;

public class Example
{
   public static void Main()
   {
      string input = "Yes. This dog is very friendly.";
      string pattern = @"((\w+)[\s.])+";
      foreach (Match match in Regex.Matches(input, pattern))
      {
         Console.WriteLine("Match: {0}", match.Value);
         for (int groupCtr = 0; groupCtr < match.Groups.Count; groupCtr++)
         {
            Group group = match.Groups[groupCtr];
            Console.WriteLine("   Group {0}: {1}", groupCtr, group.Value);
            for (int captureCtr = 0; captureCtr < group.Captures.Count; captureCtr++)
               Console.WriteLine("      Capture {0}: {1}", captureCtr, 
                                 group.Captures[captureCtr].Value);
         }                      
      }
   }
}
// The example displays the following output:
//       Match: Yes.
//          Group 0: Yes.
//             Capture 0: Yes.
//          Group 1: Yes.
//             Capture 0: Yes.
//          Group 2: Yes
//             Capture 0: Yes
//       Match: This dog is very friendly.
//          Group 0: This dog is very friendly.
//             Capture 0: This dog is very friendly.
//          Group 1: friendly.
//             Capture 0: This
//             Capture 1: dog
//             Capture 2: is
//             Capture 3: very
//             Capture 4: friendly.
//          Group 2: friendly
//             Capture 0: This
//             Capture 1: dog
//             Capture 2: is
//             Capture 3: very
//             Capture 4: friendly

Imports System.Text.RegularExpressions

Module Example
   Public Sub Main()
      Dim input As String = "Yes. This dog is very friendly."
      Dim pattern As String = "((\w+)[\s.])+"
      For Each match As Match In Regex.Matches(input, pattern)
         Console.WriteLine("Match: {0}", match.Value)
         For groupCtr As Integer = 0 To match.Groups.Count - 1
            Dim group As Group = match.Groups(groupCtr)
            Console.WriteLine("   Group {0}: {1}", groupCtr, group.Value)
            For captureCtr As Integer = 0 To group.Captures.Count - 1
               Console.WriteLine("      Capture {0}: {1}", captureCtr, _
                                 group.Captures(captureCtr).Value)
            Next
         Next                      
      Next
   End Sub
End Module
' The example displays the following output:
'       Match: Yes.
'          Group 0: Yes.
'             Capture 0: Yes.
'          Group 1: Yes.
'             Capture 0: Yes.
'          Group 2: Yes
'             Capture 0: Yes
'       Match: This dog is very friendly.
'          Group 0: This dog is very friendly.
'             Capture 0: This dog is very friendly.
'          Group 1: friendly.
'             Capture 0: This
'             Capture 1: dog
'             Capture 2: is
'             Capture 3: very
'             Capture 4: friendly.
'          Group 2: friendly
'             Capture 0: This
'             Capture 1: dog
'             Capture 2: is
'             Capture 3: very
'             Capture 4: friendly

The regular expression pattern ((\w+)[\s.])+ is defined as shown in the following table. Note that in this regular expression, a quantifier (+) is applied to the entire regular expression.

Pattern	Description
(\w+)	Match one or more word characters. This is the second capturing group.
[\s.])	Match a white-space character or period (".").
((\w+)[\s.])	Match one or more word characters followed by a white-space character or period ("."). This is the first capturing group.
((\w+)[\s.])+	Match one or more occurrences of a word character or characters followed by a white-space character or period (".").

In this example, the input string consists of two sentences. As the output shows, the first sentence consists of only one word, so the CaptureCollection object has a single Capture object that represents the same capture as the Group object. The second sentence consists of multiple words, so the Group objects only contain information about the last matched subexpression. Group 1, which represents the first capture, contains the last word in the sentence that has a closing period. Group 2, which represents the second capture, contains the last word in the sentence. However, the Capture objects in the group's CaptureCollection object capture each subexpression match. The Capture objects in the first capturing group's collection of captures contain information about each captured word and white-space character or period. The Capture objects in the second capturing group's collection of captures contain information about each captured word.

Remarks

A Capture object is immutable and has no public constructor. Instances are returned through the CaptureCollection object, which is returned by the Match.Captures and Group.Captures properties. However, the Match.Captures property provides information about the same match as the Match object.

If you do not apply a quantifier to a capturing group, the Group.Captures property returns a CaptureCollection with a single Capture object that provides information about the same capture as the Group object. If you do apply a quantifier to a capturing group, the Group.Index, Group.Length, and Group.Value properties provide information only about the last captured group, whereas the Capture objects in the CaptureCollection provide information about all subexpression captures. The example provides an illustration.

Properties

Index	The position in the original string where the first character of the captured substring is found.
Length	Gets the length of the captured substring.
Value	Gets the captured substring from the input string.
ValueSpan	Gets the captured span from the input string.

Methods

Equals(Object)	Determines whether the specified object is equal to the current object. (Inherited from Object)
GetHashCode()	Serves as the default hash function. (Inherited from Object)
GetType()	Gets the Type of the current instance. (Inherited from Object)
MemberwiseClone()	Creates a shallow copy of the current Object. (Inherited from Object)
ToString()	Retrieves the captured substring from the input string by calling the Value property.

See also

• CaptureCollection