Re: Anchoring a RE in a string

[jpkotta]

On Friday, June 8, 2012 2:08:24 PM UTC-5, Doug Lewan wrote:
> I've found the /adequate/ solution.
> 
> (setq s (delete ?\n s))
> (string-match "^\\s-+ABCD" s)
> 
> Still, is there no way of truly anchoring at the beginning of a string?
> 
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+dougl=shubertticketing.com@gnu.org
> > [mailto:help-gnu-emacs-bounces+dougl=shubertticketing.com@gnu.org] On
> > Behalf Of Doug Lewan
> > Sent: Friday, 2012 June 08 14:49
> > To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> > Subject: Anchoring a RE in a string
> > 
> > Currently I'm trying to check the /beginning/ of a multi-line string
> > with a regular expression.
> > The scenario looks like this:
> > 
> > (string-match "^\\s-+ABCD"
> >               "qwer\n    zxcv\n    ABCD")
> >                                             ^ Matches here.
> > 
> > I want it to fail because the beginning doesn't match.
> > I hadn't expected the anchor (^) to match inside the string.
> > 
> > I can't be the only one to have wanted to do this.
> > What's the right way.
> > 
> > Thanks.
> > 
> > ,Douglas
> > Douglas Lewan
> > Shubert Ticketing
> > (201) 489-8600 ext 224
> > 
> >

Use \\` instead of ^.  See "34.3.1.1 Special Characters in Regular Expressions" 
in the Elisp manual.