Ruby Regex vs Python Regex

Question

Are there any real differences between Ruby regex and Python regex?

I\'ve been unable to find any differences in the two, but may have missed something.

Answer 1

Ruby's Regexp#match method is equivalent to Python's re.search(), not re.match(). re.search() and Regexp#match look for the first match anywhere in a string. re.match() looks for a match only at the beginning of a string.

To perform the equivalent of re.match(), a Ruby regular expression will need to start with a ^, indicating matching the beginning of the string.

To perform the equivalent of Regexp#match, a Python regular expression will need to start with .*, indicating matching zero or more characters.