Word boundary

As explained in Data-Oriented Programming: Reduce software complexity

A word boundary is a position in text recognized by a regular expression as the boundary between a word character and a non-word character.

How Data-Oriented Programming: Reduce software complexity covers it

How deep it goes

Defines the boundary and demonstrates matching behavior, then stops short of explaining regular-expression engine internals.

Examples

Tests Habit, habit, 7 Habit, and habits of as matches, while abit, bit, 7 abit, and habit of return no books.

What it assumes

Assumes basic string searching and unit testing, while introducing the \b regular-expression metacharacter from zero.

What you can do after

Apply it via a regular expression to implement and test case-insensitive prefix searches across word boundaries.

How it connects

Connects word boundaries with regular expressions, prefix matching, case-insensitive matching, and unit testing.

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Also explained in

• 

  liveBookmanning.com
  Regular Expression Puzzles and AI Coding AssistantsA word boundary is a regular-expression zero-width assertion that matches a position at the transition between word and non-word characters or at a string edge.
• 

  liveBookmanning.com
  The Well-Grounded Rubyist, Fourth EditionA word boundary anchor constrains a match to a transition between word and non-word characters or to a string boundary.

Compare how 3 books explain word boundary →

Related concepts

• regular expressionused by · A formal pattern notation that describes sets of strings and enables text to be matched, searched, extracted, or transformed.
• regular-expression anchorkind of · A regular-expression anchor is a zero-width assertion that constrains matching to a specific position in text, such as its beginning or end.
• negative lookahead assertionused by · A negative lookahead assertion is a regular-expression assertion that succeeds when its pattern does not match immediately after the current position without consuming characters.
• raw string literalconfigured by · A raw string literal is a string-literal syntax that treats most backslashes and other contents literally, reducing ordinary escape processing.
• assertionkind of · A regular-expression assertion tests a condition at a position in the input without consuming characters as part of the match.

This explainer was generated by Manning's knowledge graph from the text of Data-Oriented Programming: Reduce software complexity. The section links point to the parts of the book it draws on.