You know what's worse than a regular expression? A regular expression with no anchor. That's like a party with no guest of honor. It's just a mess.
So, here's a quick primer on regex anchors:
^ and $:
These two guys are like the dynamic duo of regex.
- ^: The start of the line, the beginning of our story.
- $: The end of the line, where the plot thins out.
\b and \B:
These two are like the odd couple of regex.
- \b: A word boundary, where the love is real.
- \B: A non-word boundary, where the love is fake.
And then there's \w, \d, \s, and all the rest... But let's not get ahead of ourselves here.
For now, let's just focus on ^ and $.
Want to learn more about regex anchors? Check out Regex Groups: The Family Reunion.