PowerShell: -Match and -Notmatch regular expression matching operators

In order to use case-sensitive regular expressions, -cmatch or -cnomatch must be used. It is possible to explicitly state an insensitive match with -imatch and -inomatch.

Capture matched portions in the $matches variable

The matched portions of the tested string are captured in the $matches (array) variable.

The first element of this array stores the entire match, the subsequent elements the individual parts that were captured with parentheses:

'First number: 42, second number: 99, third number 18.' -match '(\d+)\D+(\d+)\D+(\d+)'
#
#  True

#  Print entire matching string:
$matches[0]
#
#  42, second number: 99, third number 18

#  First, second and third number:
$matches[1]
#
#  42

$matches[2]
#
#  99

$matches[3]
#
#  18

Github repository about-PowerShell, path: /language/operator/comparison/match_notmatch/matches-variable.ps1

For easier reading, it's also possible to capture a matched portion of the text with name-tag. This requires the capturing parenthesis to look look like so: (?<NAME>REGEXP). NAME then becomes the key in the $matches hash table:

'First number: 42, second number: 99, third number 18.' -match '(?<first>\d+)\D+(?<second>\d+)\D+(?<third>\d+)'
#
#  True

#  Print entire matching string:
$matches[0]
#
#  42, second number: 99, third number 18

#  First, second and third number:
$matches['first']
#
#  42

$matches['second']
#
#  99

$matches['third']
#
#  18

Github repository about-PowerShell, path: /language/operator/comparison/match_notmatch/named-capture-group.ps1

PowerShell: -Match and -Notmatch regular expression matching operators

Capture matched portions in the $matches variable

Misc

See also