Regex match including new line

Question

I have a regex to grab everything between `"*"`: ``` str = "Donec sed odio dui. *Nullam id dolor id nibh ultricies vehicula ut*" str.match(/\*(.*)\*/)[1] ``` I want the match to be able to include newline characters. How can I do it?

Accepted Answer

You'll want to use the `m` option which allows the dot to match new lines:

```
Donec sed odio dui. *Nullam id dolor id 
nibh ultricies vehicula ut*
```

regex `str.match(/\*(.*)\*/m)[1]` Live example: http://www.rubular.com/r/11u9TreEOL

Your expression will capture the text between the first and last `*` symbol, but if you want to capture all text between each set of `*` then you'd want to make the `.*` less greedy like

`str.match(/\*(.*?)\*/m)[1]` Live example http://www.rubular.com/r/rBLOnwy3By

Or you could tell it to simply match all non `*` characters like, note the `m` option is not needed as a new line character would be matched by a the negated `[^*]` character class:

`str.match(/\*([^*]*)\*/)[1]` Live example http://www.rubular.com/r/dhQzZ58ZzM

Regex match including new line

Solution

Problem