Regex-LE

Zero-Hassle Regex Extraction & Validation - Test, extract, and validate regular expressions directly inside VS Code with real-time match previews, performance scoring, and built-in ReDoS detection.

✨ Features

• 🔍 Test Regex Patterns - Test patterns against your code with detailed match information
• 📤 Extract Matches - Extract all matches from any file with one command
• ✅ Validate Patterns - Check regex validity and detect ReDoS vulnerabilities
• 🚀 Performance Scoring - Get performance metrics and optimization suggestions
• 🛡️ ReDoS Detection - Built-in protection against Regular Expression Denial of Service attacks
• 🔒 Zero-Hassle Guarantee - Works reliably on all text files with automatic safety checks

🚀 Quick Start

1. Open a file in VS Code (any text file works!)
2. Press Ctrl+Alt+R (or Cmd+Alt+R on Mac) or search for "Regex-LE: Test Regex"
3. Enter your pattern (e.g., /\\d+/ to find numbers)
4. View results with matches, positions, and performance metrics

📋 Commands

Test Regex (regex-le.test)

Test a regex pattern against the active editor content with detailed results.

Usage: Ctrl+Alt+R / Cmd+Alt+R or Command Palette → "Regex-LE: Test Regex"

Features:

• Interactive flag selection (global, case-insensitive, multiline, etc.)
• Line and column position for each match
• ReDoS vulnerability warnings
• Performance scoring and metrics
• Markdown-formatted results report

Extract Matches (regex-le.extract)

Extract all matches from the active file and display them as a list.

Usage: Command Palette → "Regex-LE: Extract Matches"

Features:

• Automatic global flag for extraction
• Clipboard integration (if enabled)
• Side-by-side results view
• Progress indication for large files

Validate Pattern (regex-le.validate)

Validate a regex pattern and check for security issues.

Usage: Command Palette → "Regex-LE: Validate Regex"

Features:

• Pattern syntax validation
• ReDoS vulnerability detection
• Performance score calculation
• Security recommendations

Settings Management

• Export Settings - Save your configuration to a JSON file
• Import Settings - Restore settings from a previously exported file
• Reset Settings - Reset all settings to defaults

📁 Supported File Types

Regex-LE works universally on any text file! Unlike format-specific extractors that require parsers, regex operates directly on text content, making it truly universal.

✅ Recommended File Types (Zero-Hassle Guaranteed)

Programming Languages

• JavaScript/TypeScript (.js, .ts, .jsx, .tsx, .mjs, .cjs)
• Python (.py, .pyw, .pyi)
• Ruby (.rb, .rake)
• Go (.go)
• Rust (.rs)
• Java (.java)
• C/C++ (.c, .cpp, .h, .hpp)
• C# (.cs)
• PHP (.php)
• Swift (.swift)
• Kotlin (.kt)
• And any other programming language

Data Formats

• JSON (.json)
• YAML (.yaml, .yml)
• TOML (.toml)
• XML (.xml, .xhtml)
• CSV (.csv)

Web Technologies

• HTML (.html, .htm)
• CSS (.css, .scss, .less, .sass)

Configuration Files

• Environment (.env, .env.local, .env.production)
• INI (.ini, .cfg, .conf)
• Config files (.config, .conf)

Documentation & Text

• Markdown (.md, .markdown)
• Plain Text (.txt)
• Log Files (.log)
• README files
• Documentation (.rst, .tex, .org)

Shell & Scripts

• Shell/Bash (.sh, .bash, .zsh)
• PowerShell (.ps1)
• Batch (.bat, .cmd)

How It Works

Regex-LE applies patterns directly to text content—no format parsing required. This means:

✅ Works on any text file VS Code can open
✅ No format-specific limitations
✅ Safety checks handle edge cases (binary detection, size limits)
✅ Reliable results guaranteed by Zero-Hassle design

Safety Features

Regex-LE automatically protects you:

• 🛡️ Binary file detection - Blocks processing of binary files
• 📏 Size limits - Warns before processing very large files
• ⚠️ ReDoS detection - Warns about vulnerable patterns
• 🚦 Match limits - Prevents excessive memory usage

Examples by File Type

JavaScript/TypeScript - Extract function names:

// Pattern: /\bfunction\s+(\w+)/g
// Matches: function declarations

JSON - Extract all string values:

// Pattern: "([^"]+)"
// Matches: All JSON string values

HTML - Extract all URLs:

<!-- Pattern: https?://[^\s"<>]+ -->
<!-- Matches: All HTTP/HTTPS URLs -->

CSV - Extract email addresses:

// Pattern: [\w.-]+@[\w.-]+\.\w+
// Matches: Email addresses in any column

Log Files - Extract timestamps:

// Pattern: \d{4}-\d{2}-\d{2}\s+\d{2}:\d{2}:\d{2}
// Matches: ISO 8601 timestamps

⚙️ Configuration

Regex-LE has minimal configuration to keep things simple. Most settings are available in VS Code's settings UI under "Regex-LE".

Key Settings

• regex.realtimePreviewEnabled - Enable real-time regex preview (future feature)
• regex.redosDetectionEnabled - Enable ReDoS vulnerability detection
• regex.maxMatchLimit - Maximum matches to return (default: 1000)
• copyToClipboardEnabled - Auto-copy extraction results
• openResultsSideBySide - Open results side-by-side
• notificationsLevel - Control notification verbosity (all, important, silent)
• safety.enabled - Enable safety checks for large files
• performance.enabled - Enable performance monitoring

For the complete list, open VS Code Settings and search for "regex-le".

Settings Management

• Export - Save your configuration to share or backup
• Import - Restore settings from a file
• Reset - Restore all settings to defaults

All settings files are validated for security and safety.

🌍 Language Support

13 languages: English, German, Spanish, French, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese (Brazil), Russian, Ukrainian, Vietnamese, Chinese (Simplified)

🧩 System Requirements

• VS Code: 1.70.0 or higher
• Platform: Windows, macOS, Linux
• Node.js: 20.0.0+ (bundled with VS Code)

🔒 Privacy & Security

• 100% local processing - No data leaves your machine
• No network requests - Everything runs locally
• Optional telemetry - Local-only logging when enabled
• Secure settings import - Validated against schema to prevent malicious configurations
• ReDoS protection - Built-in vulnerability detection

🎯 Zero-Hassle Guarantee

Regex-LE is designed to "just work" without complications:

✅ Universal text support - Works on any file VS Code can open as text
✅ Automatic safety checks - Binary files, size limits handled automatically
✅ Graceful error handling - Clear messages, not cryptic errors
✅ Performance protection - Match limits prevent resource exhaustion
✅ ReDoS awareness - Warns about vulnerable patterns before execution

Unlike format-specific extractors (which require parsers for each file type), regex operates on raw text—making it truly universal while maintaining reliability.

🆚 Comparison with Other LE Extensions

Feature	Regex-LE	Paths-LE	Secrets-LE
File Type Support	✅ Any text file	⚠️ 9 specific types	⚠️ Multiple types
Format Parsing	❌ Not needed	✅ Required	❌ Regex-based
Zero-Hassle	✅ Universal	⚠️ Format-limited	✅ Works on text
Custom Patterns	✅ User-defined	❌ Fixed patterns	⚠️ Pre-defined

Key Insight: Regex-LE offers maximum flexibility—you define the pattern, and it works universally.

📚 Learn More

• Performance Guide - Learn about regex performance optimization
• ReDoS Detection - Understanding Regular Expression Denial of Service
• File Type Analysis - See docs/FILE_TYPE_ANALYSIS.md for detailed file type support analysis

🤝 Contributing

We welcome contributions! Please see our Contributing Guidelines for details.

📝 License

MIT License - See LICENSE file for details.

🙏 Acknowledgments

Built with patterns from the LE extension family:

• Paths-LE, Secrets-LE, Numbers-LE, Dates-LE, URLs-LE, Strings-LE, EnvSync-LE, Scrape-LE

📞 Support

• GitHub Issues: Report a bug or request a feature
• Documentation: See the docs/ directory for detailed guides

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