• SonicOS 7
• Zones
  • How Zones Work
  • Predefined Zones
  • Security Types
  • Allow Interface Trust
  • Enabling SonicWall Security Services on Zones
  • Effect of Wireless and Non-Wireless Controller Modes
    • Effects of Enabling Non-Wireless Controller Mode
    • Effects of Enabling Wireless Controller Mode
  • Match Objects > Zones
    • The Zone Settings Table
    • Adding a New Zone
    • Configuring a Zone for Guest Access
    • Configuring a Zone for Open Authentication and Social Login
    • Configuring a Zone for Captive Portal Authentication with RADIUS
    • Configuring a Zone for Customized Policy Message
    • Configuring a Zone for Customized Login Page
    • Configuring the WLAN Zone
    • Configuring the RADIUS Server
    • Configuring DPI-SSL Granular Control per Zone
    • Enabling Automatic Redirection to the User-Policy Page
    • Deleting a Zone
• Addresses
  • Types of Address Objects
  • About Address Groups
  • About UUIDs for Address Objects and Groups
  • Addresses Page
    • Common Features
      • Common Functions
      • Common Column Headings
    • Sorting the Entries
  • Default Address Objects and Groups
  • Default Pref64 Address Object
  • Default Rogue Address Groups
  • Adding an Address Object
  • Editing Address Objects
  • Deleting Custom Address Objects
  • Purging MAC or FQDN Address Objects
  • Creating Address Groups
  • Editing Address Groups
  • Deleting Address Groups
  • Working with Dynamic Address Objects
    • Key Features of Dynamic Address Objects
    • Enforcing the Use of Sanctioned Servers on the Network
    • Using MAC and FQDN Dynamic Address Objects
      • Blocking All Protocol Access to a Domain using FQDN DAOs
      • Using an Internal DNS Server for FQDN-based Access Rules
      • Controlling a Dynamic Host’s Network Access by MAC Address
      • Bandwidth Managing Access to an Entire Domain
• Services
  • About Default Service Objects and Groups
  • Predefined IP Protocols for Custom Service Objects
  • Adding Service Objects using Predefined Protocols
  • Adding Custom IP Type Services
    • Configuration Example
  • Editing Custom Service Objects
  • Deleting Custom Service Objects
  • Adding Custom Service Groups
  • Editing Custom Service Groups
  • Deleting Custom Service Groups
• URI Lists
  • About URIs and the URI List
  • About URI List Groups
  • About Keywords and the Keyword List
  • Matching URI List Objects
  • Using URI List Objects
  • Managing URI List Objects
    • About the URI List Objects Table
    • Configuring URI List Objects
    • Exporting a URI List Object
    • Editing a URI List Object
    • Deleting URI List Objects
  • Managing URI List Groups
    • About the URI List Groups Table
    • Adding URI List Groups
    • Editing a URI List Group
    • Deleting URI List Groups
• Match Objects
  • About Match Objects
    • About Regular Expressions
      • Regular Expression Syntax
    • About Negative Matching
  • About Application List Objects
    • About Application Filters
    • About Category Filters
  • Configuring a Match Object
  • Configuring Application List Objects
• Schedules
  • Adding a Custom Schedule
  • Modifying Schedules
  • Deleting Custom Schedules
• Dynamic Group
  • About the Dynamic External Address Group File
  • DEAG and DEAO Maximums
  • High Availability Requirements
  • Adding a Dynamic External Object
  • Editing Dynamic External Objects
  • Deleting Dynamic External Objects
• Email Addresses
  • Configuring Email Address Objects
• SonicWall Support
  • About This Document

Regular Expression Syntax

This section provides the information about syntax that are used in building regular expressions.

Regular expression syntax: Single characters

Representation	Definition
.	Any character except ‘\n’. Use /s (stream mode, also known as single-line mode) modifier to match ‘\n’ too.
[xyz]	Character class. Can also give escaped characters. Special characters do not need to be escaped as they do not have special meaning within brackets [ ].
\xdd	Hex input. “dd” is the hexadecimal value for the character. Two digits are mandatory. For example, \r is \x0d and not \xd.
[a-z][0-9]	Character range.

Regular expression syntax: Composites

Representation	Definition
xy	x followed by y
x|y	x or y
(x)	Equivalent to x. Can be used to override precedences.

Regular expression syntax: Repetitions

Representation	Definition
x*	Zero or more x
x?	Zero or one x
x+	One or more x
x{n, m}	Minimum of n and a maximum of m sequential x’s. All numbered repetitions are expanded. So, making m unreasonably large is ill-advised.
x{n}	Exactly n x’s
x{n,}	Minimum of n x’s
x{,n}	Maximum of n x’s

Regular expression syntax: Escape sequences

Representation	Definition
\0, \a, \b, \f, \t, \n, \r, \v	‘C’ programming language escape sequences (\0 is the NULL character (ASCII character zero)).
\x	Hex-input. \x followed by two hexa-decimal digits denotes the hexa-decimal value for the intended character.
\*, \?, \+, \(, \), \[, \], \{, \}, \\, \/, \<space>, \#	Escape any special character. Comments that are not processed are preceded by any number of spaces and a pound sign (#). So, to match a space or a pound sign (#), you must use the escape sequences \ and \#.

Regular expression syntax: Perl-like character classes

Representation	Definition
\d, \D	Digits, Non-digits.
\z, \Z	Non-zero digits ([1-9]), All other characters.
\s, \S	White space, Non-white space. Equivalent to [\t\n\f\r]. \v is not included in Perl white spaces.
\w, \W	Word characters, Non-word characters Equivalent to [0-9A-Za-z_].

Regular expression syntax: Other ASCII character class primitives

If you want...	...then use
[:cntrl:]	\c, \C	Control character. [\x00 - \x1F\x7F].
[:digit:]	\d, \D	Digits, Non-Digits. Same as Perl character class.
[:graph:]	\g, \G	Any printable character except space.
[:xdigit:]	\h, \H	Any hexadecimal digit. [a-fA-F0-9]. Note this is different from the Perl \h, which means a horizontal space.
[:lower:]	\l, \L	Any lower case character.
[:ascii:]	\p, \P	Positive, Negative ASCII characters. [0x00 – 0x7F], [0x80 – 0xFF].
[:upper:]	\u, \U	Any upper case character.

Some of the other popular character classes can be built from the above primitives. The following classes do not have their own short-hand due of the lack of a nice mnemonic for any of the remaining characters used for them.

Regular expression syntax: Compound character classes

If you want...	... then use
[:alnum:]	= [\l\u\d]	The set of all characters and digits.
[:alpha:]	= [\l\u]	The set of all characters.
[:blank:]	= [\t<space>]	The class of blank characters: tab and space.
[:print:]	= [\g<space>]	The class of all printable characters: all graphical characters including space.
[:punct:]	= [^\P\c<space>\d\u\l]	The class of all punctuation characters: no negative ASCII characters, no control characters, no space, no digits, no upper or lower characters.
[:space:]	= [\s\v]	All white space characters. Includes Perl white space and the vertical tab character.

Regular expression syntax: Modifiers

Representation	Definition
/i	Case-insensitive
/s	Treat input as single-line. Can also be thought of as stream-mode. That is, ‘.’ matches ‘\n’ too.

Regular expression syntax: Operators in decreasing order of precedence

Operators	Associativity
[ ], [^]	Left to right
()	Left to right
*, +, ?	Left to right
. (Concatenation)	Left to right
|	Left to right

Comments in Regular Expressions

SonicOS supports comments in regular expressions. Comments are preceded by any number of spaces and a pound sign (#). All text after a space and pound sign is discarded until the end of the expression.