Question

How do I match a list of words using regular expression.

Like I want to match

This is a apple
This is a orange
This is a peach

I tried This is a [apple|range|peach].

Does not work.

Any ideas? I’ve sent 5 hours on this, there are “rules” published, but without exhaustive examples, these rules are too mystic.

Answer 1

You can use

    Pattern pattern = Pattern.compile( "This is a (apple|orange|peach)" );

    Matcher matcher = pattern.matcher( "This is a orange" );
    if( matcher.find() ) {
        System.out.println( matcher.group( 1 ) );
    }